


Curve

by PalerThanTheMoon



Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: AU, F/M, M/M, Nerve (2016) AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:34:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 23,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26778190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PalerThanTheMoon/pseuds/PalerThanTheMoon
Summary: An AU based off the 2016 movie Nerve.See Notes for more details.
Relationships: Alex/Willie (Julie and The Phantoms), Julie Molina/Luke Patterson
Comments: 43
Kudos: 197





	1. Are you a Watcher or a Player?

**Author's Note:**

> Nerve is a movie about a 24 hour dare game that you can earn money from if you complete the dares as a Player.
> 
> Everyone is 17 to 18 years old and graduating high school.
> 
> The guys aren't ghosts.
> 
> Carrie is a part of the friend group of Alex, Willie, Julie, and Flynn.
> 
> Carrie and Nick have never dated.
> 
> I kept this fic pretty close to the original source but making changes where needed. I do not claim this as an original work of any kind, merely just an AU I felt would fit well.
> 
> Hope you enjoy. :)

The last day of senior year had finally come. Julie woke up and got herself ready for the day, opened her laptop to her Spotify and clicked on a random playlist before opening up her email. She saw she had a new email from the Julliard administration board, the subject of the email read "URGENT: Julliard Admission Reminder". Julie had applied to Julliard months ago and was surprised when she actually got accepted into the program, no matter how talented she was she knew that getting into Julliard was a one-in-a-million shot, she hadn't even told her dad about her application because she didn't think she would be accepted and knew they couldn't afford it no matter how much her father supported her dreams. Julie sighed and slowly opened the email, it read:

 _"Dear Julie,  
_ _  
Congratulations again! This is a reminder that your reply is **due tomorrow**.  
_ _This could be the first day of the rest of your life. Click Accept and join the class of 2024!_

_Sincerely,_

_Admissions Board"_

Julie hovered over the "Click here to Accept" button but instead began drafting up a reply:

_"To whom it may concern,_

_I regret to inform the admissions board that I must decline because I'm a spineless loser and I'm too scared to tell my dad the truth which is that I want to move out and leave Los Angeles forever skgnsgns gmesalfmesk fefasfjslfm;fnael"_

Julie groaned and deleted her reply. Her laptop made a noise and a notification popped on her screen that Nick had tagged her in a post on Facebook. Julie breathed in at the sight and tentatively clicked on the notification. He had posted a picture of himself and Carrie in her Dirty Candi costume with Julie in the background with the caption "Go. Bobcats. Pep Rally Today." Facebook must have automatically tagged her in the picture, she figured but it brought a smile to her face despite herself. She found herself staring way too long at the picture, focusing on Nick, she contemplated liking the picture and as she was about to click the little thumbs up button she received a video call request from Carrie. Julie let out a small laugh and accepted the call.

"Good morning." Carrie greeted, laying on her bed propped up on her elbows, chin in her hand. "Whatcha doin'? Besides stalking Nick, of course."

"I'm reading the news, thank you very much." Julie lied before opening a new tab on her browser and opening up Huffington Post.

"Oohh you're reading the news? You're such a good liar!" Carrie retorted with a smile.

Julie laughed, "Seriously, how did you know I was stalking Nick?" she asked in defeat.

"Because I know you very, very well." Carrie answered matter-of-factly. "Oh wait! Did you tell your dad about Julliard yet?"

"Yeah, I told him. He's super excited for me to move across the country and go to a really expensive music school."

"Really?" Carrie asked, failing to hide her surprise.

"No," Julie let out a laugh.

"No?"

"No, I haven't found the right time to tell him." Julie stated, looking away from Carrie on her laptop. She received a notification from Facebook messenger from Carrie with a URL code.

"Oooh Curve is starting!" She exclaimed. "Sorry, this is really important."

"What's Curve?" Julie asked, clicking the link Carrie sent her.

"It's a game, here, just click on the video." Carrie told her.

Julie did as instructed and a robotic voice played over a series of random gifs and memes that sort of correlated with what the voice was saying:

 **"Welcome to Curve: Los Angeles!  
** **Curve is a 24 hour game like Truth or Dare minus the Truth.  
** **Watchers pay to watch.  
** **Players play to win cash and glory.  
** **Are you a Watcher or a Player?  
** **Are you a Watcher or a Player?  
** **Are you a Watcher or a Player?"**

"It's cool, right?" Carrie said when the video stopped playing.

"This looks... very sketchy." Julie replied. "Is this legal?"

"I don't know. Probably not." Carrie admitted. "Just do it, just sign up and watch me."

"Okay, signing up. Look --" Julie feigned typing, "this is me signing up to watch you."

"Jules!" Carrie cried out. "You have to sign up and watch me. It's very important that I have Watchers."

"Julie!" A voice called from downstairs.

"I have to go, my dad is calling me. I'll sign up after breakfast, I promise." Julie told her.

"Thank you, I love you. I'll see you in a little bit." Carrie replied.

Julie gave a small wave, "Bye."

"Bye." And the call ended.

* * *

Julie went downstairs and sat at the table with her brother, Carlos, while they waited for their dad to finish making the pancakes. They exchanged pleasant small talk about how everyone's night was and Carlos began talking about the weird dreams he's been having lately which earned laughter from everyone present. The conversation eventually turned to colleges and Julie was trying her hardest not to have the attention on her regarding this matter so she instead brought up Carrie.

"I mean, Carrie hasn't gotten into any colleges yet and she doesn't even care."

"You know what? Carrie doesn't have to care, she has a trust fund and you have something far more valuable than that." Ray stated.

"Here we go." Julie muttered under breath.

"You have drive. You have focus. You have a scholarship to a local college and even though we can't afford the dorm you get to have us as your new college roommates." Ray carried on, kissing the top of her head as he placed the pancakes on the table.

Julie smiled before taking a pancake from the platter and keeping her attention on the maple syrup she was pouring on them, "Actually I... um... I have kind of a cool idea about that." She began, still not looking at her dad, "What if we fixed up mom's old studio and listed you on Air B&B or something. Maybe it's time we finally go through her stuff and maybe give some of it to Good Will and I could give you some space."

"I don't want space," Ray said, getting Julie to look at him, "I just want you guys." He looked from Julie to Carlos.

Julie hid her disappointment and put on a fake smile, "Okay. I'm totally down with commuting. I can get my reading down on the ride there."

"Yeah? That'll work, right?"

"Yeah." Julie nodded. She finished her pancakes and headed out the door, stopping by the garage to give it a quick, nostalgic once over. She found an old picture in a frame of her and mom when she was much younger, together in a field. It was her favourite picture of them. A sad smile displayed on her face before she put the picture back down on the table and continued on her way to school, grabbing her bike and heading out, forgetting about signing up for Curve altogether.

* * *

Julie found Flynn in the stands of the gym, she had saved her a spot and Julie squeezed her way in beside her fashionable bestie. The gym was loud with murmurs from all the various conversations students were having with one another. The last day of the school year. The last pep rally for Los Feliz High School.

"Did you see that Nick tagged me in a post this morning?" Julie asked Flynn, her eyes trained dreamily on the aforementioned boy further down the rows on the bleachers.

"Seriously? Nick? Still?" Flynn rolled her eyes.

"Nick's a sweetheart." Julie said, finally tearing her eyes away from the blond boy and looking at Flynn.

"Yeah you'd actually have to talk to him to know that." Flynn pointed out. Nick and Julie were friends by association, he was friends with Carrie and so was Julie but they weren't really friend with each other, just acquaintances.

Carrie was dressed in her Dirty Candi costume with her four backup dancers, they were scheduled to perform at the last pep rally of the year and Carrie never shied away from an opportunity to be in the spotlight. She noticed their friend Alex in the crowd and called out his name while running over to him before her performance was to start. She grabbed her phone off the bench that she had put her stuff and handed it to Alex, "Are you ready? Tell me when you're ready." She said to him as he opened the Curve app and began recording Carrie.

"You're on!" He exclaimed excitedly.

"Hey Watchers, it's Dirty Candi. I'm counting on you to get me to the final round so don't let me down and I won't let you down, I promised!" Carrie said into her phone, finishing with a wink and blowing a kiss to the camera. She smirked at Julie when she locked eyes with her in the crowd.

Julie returned her smile but was a little confused as to what her and Alex had planned. "What's she doing?" she whispered to Flynn.

Alex raised his arms up higher to get a better angle as Carrie ran back out to the centre of the gym where her performance was starting. She performed an original song of her own called "Wow" and when it was done she gave a saucy wink before turning around and mooning the crowd.

The crowd gasped before cheers and laughter broke out and one person shouted "How out that ass though!" Carrie simply pulled her pants back over her butt and resumed facing the crowd before doing a final bow. Her dare had been completed. Julie and Flynn exchanged a look, both shocked at what their friend just did but eventually began laughing too.

* * *

The school day was finally over and their group of friends all decided to go to a local cafe to celebrate. Carrie checked her phone to see how she was doing in the Curve leaderboard and saw that she had earned $500.00 for that last dare.

"Oohh money money!" She sang. "I have so many watchers now."

"Yeah you do, girl!" Alex chimed in happily, excited for his friend.

"I just need to get into that little box thingy." Carrie said, referring to the top ten Players, "Who's winning now?"

"Uhh apparently this guy named Caleb, I guess he did some magic trick thing in a supposedly haunted hotel." Alex told her, looking at his own phone.

"I could do that." Carrie said, not phased.

"Well we don't know any haunted hotels." Alex told her.

"Or--or magic tricks, Alex." Willie chimed in, pointing out the obvious.

Alex ignored him, "Ooohh they're coming up with your next dare!" He sang to Carrie as her phone lit up.

"What is it? I need something flashy like the magic thing." Carrie asked, annoyed.

Julie and Flynn had finally gotten their food and joined the group, Julie sat next to Alex and Flynn say behind her in the other booth, still a part of the conversation though. They greeted the group.

"Ew, not that. How do they know you're afraid of water?" Alex asked Carrie, looking at his phone to see the possible dares that would be given to Carrie.

"What?" Carrie asked, suddenly very serious.

"That's what they do." Willie piped up. "It's easy, they just take all your info from your old profiles and put it in your Curve profile."

"That's so creepy!" Carrie exclaimed.

"Are you serious? I thought you'd be done playing Curve after the lecture you got from our principal." Julie was in disbelief.

"Hell no! The girl who won in Seattle now has millions of followers, she is InstaFamous." Carrie stated.

"Who cares?" Julie rolled her eyes.

"I care! Jules, I don't expect you to understand... I'm an adrenaline junky... you like to stay within your comfort zone, that's fine."

"That's not true!" Julie defended, "What about that pole dancing class we took."

"Jules, I dragged you there and you sat in the corner and watched." Carrie deadpanned.

"I'm a visual learner!" Julie stated.

"Why are you attacking her?" Flynn finally spoke up, questioning Carrie.

"I'm not attacking her --"

"--Yeah you are!"

"--Flynn. Life is passing you by, you need to learn to take a few risks every once in a while." Carrie said to Julie.

"I do take risks!" Julie said.

"Really? Okay. Fine." Carrie wasn't buying what Julie was saying. "Let's just say, hypothetically, you're playing Curve. What would be a good Curve dare for Julie?" She looked around at the rest of the group.

"Make out with Nick!" Alex whispered, leaning into Julie, shimmying his shoulders a bit.

"Baby steps!" Willie cut in. "Baby steps. Just talk to Nick."

"What? I -" Julie didn't know what to say.

"He probably likes you too, you'll just never know if you don't talk to him." Carrie encouraged.

"And then, everybody who's watching you would go on and vote 'who wants to see Julie macking on Nick?" Willie added.

"Oh my god!" Alex sing-songed to Julie.

"You guys!" Julie tried intervening.

"Who wants to see Julie macking on Nick say 'yes'. Yes." Carrie said polling the group. Both Willie and Alex voted yes, Carrie looked past Julie to Flynn, "I'm assuming no?"

"I abstain." Flynn stated earning a thanks from Julie.

"Alright, you've been dared. Do you accept your dare, Jules?" Carrie said.

Julie looked from Carrie to Alex who whispered for her to say yes, excitedly. "What's the point? We're graduating--"

"All you have to do is say hi." Carrie pushed.

"I don't -- I don't want to say hello to him."

"Fine." Carrie sighed. "I love you so much, Jules but you're a Watcher so watch me do it for you."

"No, no no, Carrie!" Julie tried to reach for Carrie's arm as she stood up and began walking over to where Nick had been with his lacrosse team further down the café. Carrie quickly avoided her reach and skipped over to the team, Julie could only watch on in silent horror.

"Hey, Nick." She greeted when she got to their table, pushing his shoulder slightly to get his attention.

"What's up?" He asked, smiling at her.

"Um... I was wondering, do you have a girlfriend right now?"

Julie stared in shock and tried to find away to hide herself as best as she could.

"It's not for me." Carrie added. "It's for a friend."

Nick's smile depleted, "Well which friend?" he asked. Carrie coyly pointed in Julie's direction. He followed the direction of her finger and locked eyes with Julie. Julie gave him a shy wave and Nick tried his best to give her a faint smile before turning around and looking back to Carrie, "Uh... nah... she's not really my type..." He told her.

Julie shook her head, overhearing his statement. She couldn't believe he could say something like that when she thought he was such a sweetheart.

"You're not nearly as hot as you think you are." Carrie told him, clapping him on the shoulder again only this time more aggressively.

Julie gathered her things and got up from the booth, leaving the café. Ignoring her friends protests.

"Jules!" Carrie shouted after her as she came back to the booth their group had been sitting at. "Julie!"

"Just let her go." Flynn stated shaking her head at Carrie, "Not cool, Carrie."

"I'm just trying to help her." Carrie defended, sighing and sitting back down in the booth.

"It's not helping." Flynn deadpanned.

* * *

Julie needed the air that the bike ride home provided her. She was fuming. She spent so long yearning for a guy who dismissed her so easily. She had never planned on acting on her feelings but to know for sure that he didn't feel the same was a kick in the gut. Not to mention how Carrie kept trying to push her to do it in the first place and then embarrassed her like that in front of their friends, the lacrosse team, and anyone else who had witnessed it in the café. Her frustrations boiled over and she let out a loud scream as she rode down the street.

Her phone dinged, signaling an incoming text, she reached into her pocket and took out her phone to see she had a message from Carrie that read:

_I'm sorry Jules_

_You're too smart for him anyways_

Shortly after, Flynn followed up with her own text reading:

_Screw Carrie. Not everyone has to be a Player_

Julie took a deep breath and shook her head, not answering any of the texts she received, and put her phone back in her pocket before carrying on home. She immediately went to her room and threw her bag on her bed. She looked at her laptop to see that she had left it open and still had the Curve sign up page up. She approached her desk as if she were in a trance and stared at the screen a moment before finally, out of spite, choosing Player.

 **"Hello.”** That same robotic voice greeted her. " **Welcome to Curve. You have chosen Player. Curve is a direct democracy. Watchers decide your dares. The two players with the most Watchers by the end of regulation will advance to the final round where the winner takes all. Watchers can watch from anywhere but they are encouraged to film live so don't be alarmed. There are three rules:**

  1. **All dares must be filmed on the Players' phone.**
  2. **There are only two ways to be eliminated; fail or bail.**
  3. **Snitches get stitches.**



**Thank you for keeping Curve a secret. Good luck, Player."**

Julie's phone chimed again and she reached over to pick it up, the app had already been downloaded onto her phone and was asking her to enter her ID and a fingerprint showed on the screen. She hesitantly held her finger against her phone and took it away when the image disappeared.

 _Are you ready for your first dare?_ Popped up on the screen with the only option to accept. Julie tapped the accept button and was put on standby for five minutes while the Watchers' decided her dare, not realizing the game was also going through all her social media platforms and creating her profile for her from there, including her bank account information so that the money earned will be directly deposited into her account. She grabbed her coat and called Flynn, she was going to need some backup for this.


	2. Player

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julie accepts her first dare.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The plan is to post a new chapter once a week on Fridays!

"Flynn!" Julie said when Flynn finally answered her phone, running down the stairs and heading out the door.

"Hey, I'm pulling up outside, what the hell is so urgent?" Flynn asked, sounding concerned.

"We have to go to Eats and Beats! We have fifteen minutes." Julie states, approaching Flynn's vehicle.

"Why? What's going on?" Flynn asked her, confused.

Julie shook her head, "I signed up for Curve and that's where my first dare is." She opened the door to Flynn's car.

"What do you mean, you signed up as a Player?!" Flynn questioned, shocked at her friends decision. Hanging up the phone when Julie entered her car.

"What? Is that so hard to believe?" Julie asked defensively, earning a dramatic gesture of a head exploding from her sassy friend. Julie laughed and put her seatbelt on as Flynn started up the car again.

They had been driving for about five minutes when Flynn felt the need to warn her friend about the dangers of this game, "You know that some kid supposedly died in Seattle playing Curve."

"Oh I don't buy that." Julie scoffed, "If kids were dying, the game would be shut down."

"They can't shut it down." Flynn explained. "There's not a single-server."

"What does that mean?"

"Everybody that logs on to the game becomes a new server." Flynn continued. "So, it's impossible to turn the game off."

Julie was beginning to get a little annoyed with her friends pessimistic attitude. "How do you even know so much about this game, you've never even played!"

"Look, I spend a lot of time on the dark web." Flynn said, a little ashamed.

"Oh, a lot of time on the dark web, is that right?" Julie questioned.

"Yes, that is right. You're only accessing 10% of the internet, you know." Flynn glanced over at Julie who instead looked out the passenger window, she sighed, "Why are you even doing this? Seriously, it's dangerous. Is this because of Carrie?"

"T-this is not about, Carrie." Julie stammered, shaking her head.

"It's just not like you." Flynn added.

"That's the point." Julie said, trying to convince both herself and Flynn.

* * *

They finally arrived at the café and Julie's phone made a noise as they walked in. She looked down and checked her phone to see she had received her first Curve dare.

**KISS A STRANGER FOR FIVE SECONDS = $100**

"Kiss a stranger for five seconds?" Julie read aloud in disbelief.

"A stranger?" Flynn repeated, looking over Julie's shoulder at the phone and already getting a bad feeling about this. She shook her head, "Jules, I will give you a hundred dollars." She didn't feel right letting her best friend kiss some random person and would rather take the plunge than see her have to go through with it.

The two looked around the café at the patrons, scoping out their prospects. Julie let out a determined breath and swiped to accept her dare.

"You're just going to kiss some random person?" Flynn asked, following closely behind Julie who had started making her way further into the café. Julie didn't respond and kept walking forward, they looked around at a few of the customers but the café seemed to be filled with couples, people older than her father, or people who didn't look like they cared much for their personal hygiene.

**HURRY UP**

"Just kiss that guy." Flynn pointed at some random guy in frustration. The guy looked around their age, he had shaggy brown hair and was seated at a booth with a Dahlia flower laying on the table. At least in her frustrations she still managed to point out a guy who cute and age appropriate, she wondered if that had to be some sort of sign.

"Okay." Julie took a breath, "You sit here," She gestured to the booth they were standing next to, a few booths away from her target, "and tell me when you're rolling." She handed her phone to Flynn.

"Is this Mission Impossible now?" Flynn asked, still not completely happy with the fact that her best friend was about to kiss some random guy she had never met before, even if she had been the one to point him out.

Julie slowly approached the guy's table as Flynn got settled in the booth, holding Julie's phone out to film the dare. Julie reached her destination and had to think of a way to strike up conversation with this random guy. She looked at the flower laying on the table as a good place to start.

"D-Dahlias. They're my favourite flower." She cleared her throat, nervous about the situation.

The guy looked up at her, "Really?" He asked, slightly awkward. "I guess they are pretty."

Julie stared at the guy, not knowing what to say next, she spared a glance back at Flynn who motioned for her to hurry up if she wanted to complete her dare in time. "Umm, yeah but that's not what they're my favourite. They were actually my mom's favourite, she loved them because they symbolize a lasting bond and lifelong commitment between two people..." Julie found herself rambling, suddenly feeling embarrassed that she disclosed all that to a total stranger, and cleared her throat again.

"Oh, cool. I didn't realize flowers had meanings like that. Is your mom a florist or something?"

"What? Oh, no... She was really into music, was actually in a few bands when she was around my age but went the more practical route when she had my brother and me, she died last year--" Julie was having word vomit and she had to stop herself from and take a second to gain her composure back. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that, I didn't mean to make things awkward."

The guy had been smiling at her until that point where a solemn look replaced his smile, shaking his head, "No, it's okay. I asked. I'm sorry about your mom though." He seemed genuine.

Julie looked back at Flynn who held up her hand and mouthed the words 'five seconds' to her. Julie shook out her nerves, it was now or never, and shook her head as she quickly brought herself down on the bench beside the stranger and kissed him before losing all nerve she had in it.

Flynn began counting until she reached five seconds. "Done." She said louder than she normally would. "Done." She repeated, raising her voice even more, trying to get Julie's attention. "Done!" She said one final time, almost yelling.

Julie finally pulled away from the guy.

"...Okay." The guy breathed out his word, shocked by what had just happened.

"Okay, bye." Julie clapped the guy on the chest and quickly left his booth to rejoin Flynn.

**DARE COMPLETE**

"Oh my god, I can't believe I just did that!" She exclaimed as she collapsed into the booth across from Flynn and shrunk down.

Flynn mirrored her actions and then sat up. "What am I doing, why am I embarrassed?" She asked herself.

"Did you get it?" Julie asked.

"Yeah, it was miniseries. I got all six episodes!" Flynn sassed, pushing Julie's phone across the table to her.

Julie glanced back at the booth where the guy she had just kissed had been sitting but he was no longer there. "Where did he go?" She asked, looking back at Flynn.

Flynn followed Julie's gaze, "I have no clue."

Julie put her face in her heads and shook her head, she was mortified by the scenario she just put herself in. Her phone made a cash register sound and she quickly reached over and grabbed her phone to see what it said. "'Julie, a hundred dollars has been wired into your account.' Should I check?" Julie asked.

"You should totally check." Flynn rolled her eyes.

Suddenly music began blaring through the speakers of the café and someone was tapping on glasses with a spoon to get the customers of the cafe's attention. Julie and Flynn both looked to see what the commotion was about and saw that the guy she had just kissed was the source. It took Julie a second to realize the song playing was Mamma Mia by ABBA and that the guy from earlier was performing an impromptu musical number.

" _Here I go again, my my how could I resist ya?  
Mamma Mia, does it show again?  
My my, Just how much I missed you!"_

He began dancing on top of tables and singing to various people, growling a bit into the song as he had fun with it. His voice was surprisingly good and Julie couldn't help but laugh at his antics.

" _Yes I've been broken hearted,  
Blue since the day we parted.  
My my, did I ever let you go?  
Mama Mia, now I really know  
I could never let you go."_

The guy danced around the café, getting hoots of encouragement from people enjoying the show. He finished at Flynn and Julie's table, looking at Julie as he sang the last line of his performance. The patrons of the café applauded him when he finished. Julie gave him a smile and gave him small claps as well. A waitress handed him his phone back and the girls quickly realized it was a Curve dare.

"You won your dare, congratulations." Julie acknowledged, looking up at him from where she was seated in the booth.

The guy nodded, "Back at'cha."

"Mine was totally embarrassing but hey, at least I got a hundred bucks, right?" Julie tried to play it off as if it hadn't been a nerve wracking ordeal for her.

"Hey, I'm sorry," The guy sat down beside Flynn, who begrudgingly made room for the stranger, muttering under her breath how she was already sitting there. "I promise, I didn't know you were coming. They just told me to sit in that booth and some kid came by and gave me that flower."

"The Dahlia. Yeah, my mom's favourite." Julie sighed.

"Exactly." Flynn piped up, "Because it's on your Facebook page. They know all your information, Jules."

"Your name's Jules?" The guy asked, looking from Flynn to Julie.

"Short for Julie." She shrugged.

"I like that." He said to her, getting her to smile. "I'm Luke."

"Well, she's named after her mom. Julie is a Latin name meaning Rose, amongst other things, and Julie's mom's name was Rose. The flower of love." Flynn stated. Julie was motioning for her to stop talking and Flynn furrowed her brows in confusion. She looked from Julie to Luke her and gave a forced smile to try and break any tension or awkwardness.

"Yeah, I guess my parents were expecting someone else." Julie tried to laugh off.

Luke shook his head with a smirk, "I don't know about that. That was some kiss." He told her before getting up from the booth, "I've got a game to play but, uhh, goodnight to you ladies." He reached over and grabbed a fry from the plate that had been left at the table and popped it in his mouth. "Thank you."

As he got out of the booth both his and Julie's phones went off, signaling a new dare. The two looked at their phones and then looked at one another without saying anything.

"What?" Flynn asked, reaching across the table and taking Julie's phone to see what it said.

**GO TO MALIBU WITH HIM = $200**

"Apparently the Watchers like us together." He said, trying to sound casual but you could tell he also felt slightly awkward about it.

"I mean, you can't even go to Malibu, right?" Flynn asked Julie, handing her phone back to her.

"Yeah, no. I can't go to Malibu." Julie started, "I'm not even playing. I was just doing one dare."

"You sure?" Luke asked her, getting a puppy dog look on his face. "It's $200."

"Uh, she's pretty sure." Flynn stepped in. She didn't like this stranger trying to peer pressure her into playing the game, it was bad enough Carrie embarrassed her earlier to the point that Julie had signed up for the game and they were now sitting in a café with a stranger she had kissed.

"Does she always tell you what to do?" He tried to joke but the tension was thick in the air.

Julie looked from Luke to Flynn, slightly annoyed by her friend speaking on her behalf, "No. No, she doesn't." She said, staring at Flynn the whole time earning an exasperated eyeroll from her bestie.

Luke noticed the tension between the two friends and decided to excuse himself from the situation. "I'm gonna be outside, if you change your mind. It was nice to meet you, Julie." He told her before walking off and leaving the café.

"He thought that _those_ were our fries." Flynn laughed, motioning to the plate that was at the table when they sat down.

Julie looked from Flynn to her phone in deep thought. "I could use $200." She finally said.

"Jules, you're not going to Malibu." Flynn protested, "You said one dare."

Julie looked in the direction Luke had gone off in and then looked at Flynn, a smile slowly breaking across her face as she found herself easing her way out of the booth. "I'm sorry." She whispered.

Flynn rolled her eyes for the millionth time that night. "You know, Charles Manson was a singer." She called after Julie as she followed in the direction the guy had went.

Julie looked around the parking lot and found the stranger from earlier fiddling with a motorcycle. _His_ motorcycle. She slowly approached him, not entirely sure just what she was getting herself into but also not being able to deny the connection she was feeling with this guy.

He looked up from his motorcycle and smiled as he saw her approaching, leaning back a bit on the bike, "I was hoping you would come."

"I'm just warning you, I don't think I'll make a very good partner." Julie started, "I'm not the daredevil type. You should team up with my friend Carrie actually, she's obsessed with playing Curve."

"But..." Luke reached behind him and grabbed a helmet, handing it out to her, "The Watchers seem to want me to team up with you."

Julie looked down, collecting her thoughts and weighing her options. Deciding if she really wanted to go through with this or not. This wasn't about what Carrie had said anymore, she wanted to go with him. She wasn't even sure why, she didn't even know this guy. Sure, he was cute and she felt a connection with him but did she trust him enough to team up with him, to ride on his motorcycle with him? She took a deep breath, she already knew the answer, she knew the instant she left Flynn at the booth.

"The second I feel uncomfortable, I'm out." Julie stated, laying down some form of boundaries between them. If she was going to make a ridiculous decision like this, she wanted to at least set some guidelines.

"That's fair." He assured her.

Julie grabbed the motorcycle helmet and the two shared a look, a smile spreading across his face as he looked at her. "Okay..." She said, making her way to the back of his motorcycle and getting on.

**TAKE HER TO MALIBU**

**REJECT ACCEPT**

He pressed Accept and a timer started with 45 minutes counting down. He starts his bike and the two begin their journey. "Hold on." He tells her as he begins increasing their speed and heading to their destination.


	3. Malibu

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julie and Luke head to Malibu to complete their dares.

Carrie had just finished doing a rather embarrassing dare where she used an app that made farting sounds and pretended to fart on or around random strangers in downtown Malibu. Wasn't her favourite dare to be doing but she wanted to win so she put on her best pageant smile and pretended it was just another performance. She had earned some rather mixed reactions from the strangers; some would just get startled and sort of back away from her without saying anything, some would scream and run away, others just wouldn't say anything but just put distance between themselves and Carrie.

"Oh my god!" Willie exclaimed over and over again as Carrie finally ran back to her friends.

She glanced at her phone and saw that the number of Watchers she had was increasing. "It's going up! It's going up so much!" She said in excitement before the two reconvened with Alex, "Who's your favourite Player!"

"Well," Alex looked from Carrie to his phone, "I mean, I was going to say you, but..." He showed Carrie his phone of a live feed from a Watcher who had caught Julie on their phone, "now I don't know." He smirked.

Carrie took his phone. "Is that Julie?" She asked, in disbelief.

"Yeah!" Alex said, "She's playing and she has, like, a lot of Watchers."

"Oh my god, girl!" Willie said with a big smile on his face, watching the feed as well.

* * *

"Alright, this is it." Luke said as the two got off his motorcycle and looked at their destination. It was an upscale department store that Julie would never find herself in, in a million years.

"Am I supposed to come in with you?" Julie questioned, unsure of what to do next as she hadn't received her next dare yet.

"Uhh..." Luke looked down at his phone to see what his next objective was. "Doesn't say anything about that." He finished, rounding his bike and standing in front of Julie.

"Well... thank you... for the lift." Julie placed the helmet he gave her back on his bike.

"You, uhh... you gonna be okay?" Luke asked her.

"Yeah!" Julie waved off, "Yeah, no, I'm tired so I'm probably just gonna make my way back home."

"Cool." Luke acknowledged, his phone began making the 'hurry up' sound. "Uhh... I guess, I guess this is good bye..."

"Yeah..." Julie laughed awkwardly.

"I gotta..." He motioned to his phone before slowly backing away and heading in the direction of the store.

Julie shook her head and rolled her eyes as Luke walked away. She had still been nervous and awkward with him but she was also a little disappointed that their time together was cut short. She sighed and looked around to plan out how she'll be getting home. Until her phone made a noise indicating she got a new dare. Julie pulled out her phone and checked to see what it said:

**TRY ON THIS DRESS = $500**   
**REJECT ACCEPT**

The dress is the photo was purple and magenta, like a short halter topped party dress with rhinestones along the neckline, the centre rhinestone being in the shape of a heart. It was beautiful. Julie smiled to herself and deliberated on whether or not to accept the dare. She accepted as she quickly made her way across the street and entered the high-end department store.

* * *

Ray was on site at one of his photo shoots when he got a notification on his phone. They took a break and he quickly checked to see if it was a text from one of his kids. Instead he was surprised to see a notification from his bank that $100.00 had been deposited in Julie's account, since she was a minor when they opened her account they had to have it joint with his and they hadn't separated her account yet. Another notification came in saying that $200.00 had also been deposited into the account.

"What is she doing?" Ray thought out loud, puzzled by the sudden influx of money.

* * *

Julie was looking around the department store, everything around her was way out of her price range and she had to clench her jaw from feeling like it would drag along the ground in front of her. She saw a man standing at one of the fragrance counters and approached him. "Excuse me, um... sorry but I was wondering if you knew where I could find this dress?"

She asked as she showed him her phone with the picture.

"Your dad's calling." The man deadpanned as instead of seeing a picture of a dress he was presented with a call screen depicting "Incoming Call: DAD" Julie quickly retracted her arm and swiped her dad's call away before reaching her arm back out to show the man the picture of the dress. "That's very expensive." He stated when he finally saw the dress she was referring to. When Julie didn't back down he sighed, "Fourth floor."

Julie thanked him without looking him in the eye and quickly made her way to the fourth floor through the elevator. When the elevator opened to the fourth floor she hastily examined the dress options, looking for the one in the picture. She had earned a few distasteful glances from the women working in the section, as well as other snobby rich women who clearly weren't impressed with her casual attire-clad presence being there. She finally found the dress she was looking for on a mannequin and looked around to see if anyone was watching her, she reached for the tag on the dress and felt queasy when she saw it was close to $4,000.00. She began unzipping the dress so she could try it on.

"Please do not undress the mannequins." A female employee said, startling Julie.

"Sorry..."

"Would you like to try this on?" The woman asked, looking from the dress to Julie.

"Mhmm." Julie nodded. Trying, and failing, to hide her nervousness.

The woman looked Julie over, "Let me see if I have it in... _your_ size." She said through a plastered on smile.

"Thank you!" Julie ignored her insinuation, "If you could hurry up... I'm a little bit late for a.... for a party!"

"Cute." The woman retorted as she went to grab the dress in a size she figured would fit Julie. She grabbed the dress and lead Julie to a changing room. "Okay, right this way." She placed the dress on a hanger inside the changing room, "If you need anything else, just let me know."

"Thanks!" Julie said hurriedly and pulled the curtain door across the doorway in front of the room. She placed her phone on the ground and began undressing, not completely happy to be undressing in front of strangers watching her but wanting to complete the dare so she had sucked it up and started shedding layers. She had 30 seconds to get the dress on. By the time she was in just her bra and underwear the time on the counter had already been more than halfway over, she had ten seconds remaining to get the dress on. She stepped into the dress and put it on as quickly as she could and grabbed her phone.

Zero seconds remained on the clock. "Okay! Dressed." Julie stated as she opened the curtain and stepped out into the waiting area. She panned the camera on her phone to show that she was fully wearing the dress. "Hello?" She tapped her phone as she wasn't sure if she had completed the dare in time or not.

"Everything okay?" Another female employee asked as she walked by Julie.

"Oh, everything is great. Thank you." Julie responded and watched as the woman walked away. Julie glanced at herself in the mirror and was pleasantly surprised at what she saw. She had never worn anything as fancy as this before and she felt beautiful and confident in it. She decided to let her hair down and let her voluptuous curls envelope her shoulders. With the confidence the dress was giving her she pretended to flirt with someone while looking at herself in the mirror. It was awkward and clunky at best but Julie was enjoying herself so she didn't care. It's not like anyone was around to see her embarrass herself anyway.

"Julie..." Luke's voice gave her a start and she spun around to see that he had come out of a dressing room not far from her own, wearing more formal attire himself. "Hey." He greeted, surprised to see her and especially surprised to see her now wearing a fancy dress rather than the clothes she was wearing earlier.

"Hi..." Julie greeted back with an awkward laugh.

"You... uh... you look very pretty." He complimented, scratching the back of his head.

"Thanks! So do you." Julie mentally slapped herself, "I mean, you look hot... or handsome..." Julie hated how nervous she felt and how awkward she was being. "Do you know what we're supposed to do now?" She asked him as his phone went off signaling a new dare.

"The Watchers would like me to complete your ensemble, mademoiselle. " He told her, holding up his phone to record her.

* * *

Flynn was still at the diner, she opened up Curve on her phone and was greeted with the opening screen asking if she wanted to be a Watcher or a Player. "Neither... Is that an option?" She said to herself before begrudgingly picking Watcher and receiving a warning that it would cost $19.99 to watch her favourite players for 24 hours. She pressed the OK button and sighed, "Alright, how about my first born son too, yeah?" She entered her ID and received the username **ANON 27543**. Flynn looked up Julie's name to see what she was up to with the stranger she ran off with. Multiple videos from different angles popped up, ranging from her own phone recording to nearby Watchers' to even the Luke guy she had run off with. Flynn clicked on the stream that was coming from Julie's phone and saw that she was now wearing a purple dress, which did look great on her Flynn had to admit, and a black leather jacket that was bedazzled. "Girl, what are you doing?"

* * *

"How much is it, sir?" Julie asked, playing the role of a rich heiress.

"That'll be $900.00, madam."

Luke played along, picking an outrageous number off the top of his head.

"Well, in that case, I'll take two. One for the city and one for The Hamptons." Julie laughed.

"Excellent choice, mademoiselle." Luke chuckled, "I'll wrap it up for you right away." The two laughed before heading back to their respective change rooms. "Uh... I'll see you downstairs?"

Luke asked.

"Yeah!" Julie agreed excitedly before entering her change room. That excitement was short lived however, for when she entered her change room she saw that it was empty, everything she had left in there was gone. She went back out and thought maybe she had went in the wrong change room and checked the one beside her. It was also empty. Frustrated, she exited the change room and began looking under chairs in the waiting area to see if it somehow got stuffed underneath.

An employee walked by and Julie grabbed her attention and asked if she had possibly moved her belongings out of the change room. The woman scoffed, "Of course not." and walked away.

Julie sighed and ran back into her change room, pulling the curtain across and began having a mild panic attack. "This is not happening." She whispered to herself, pacing the room. She looked at her phone to see if she was given any direction from the Watchers on what to do next but nothing was coming up.

"Julie!?" Luke's voice called out.

Julie quickly ran to the curtain and opened it, "Luke?" she said as she pulled Luke inside when she saw him. She closed the curtain once more and turned around to look at him, "Did you take my stuff? I mean my wallet, my clothes... everything's gone!" Her voice was shaky.

"I know, my stuff is gone too." He told her.

Suddenly, Julie finally received a new dare from her Watchers. Luke's phone also went off too and the two stared at each other after reading the dare.

**LEAVE THE STORE = $2,500.00**   
**REJECT ACCEPT**

"...No!" Julie stated.

"Okay, um..."

"No." Julie shook her head.

"We have to make a run for it." Luke said as he grabbed her arm and tried to leave the change room.

"No!" Julie stated again, pulling her arm away from Luke and staying in the change room.

"Come on, let's go! Let's go!" Luke urged.

"I am not shoplifting!" Julie whisper-yelled.

"Look, we don't have a choice." Luke told her, matching her whisper. "Come on."

Julie took a second to think about this, her phone making the hurry up noise and she furrowed her eyebrows at it in response. She needed to think. To come up with some other idea. She didn't have her clothes but she knew she wasn't going to leave the store wearing the expensive clothes she had on. They had a minute and 45 seconds on the clock for them to get out of the store. She let out a sigh of frustration as an idea finally came to her. "Okay, technically it just says we have to leave the store." She told him.

Luke looked puzzled for a moment before looking down at his phone and reading the dare again. The connection clicked and he knew exactly what she meant. A smirk appeared on his face, surprised that Julie had come up with this idea.

"Right?" Julie asked, unsure.

The two decided that this was the only other option they had besides stealing the clothes and quickly turned away from one another and removed the clothes they had tried on. Luke had turned away first, not questioning that Julie would want some sort of privacy as she removed the clothes, not wanting to make the situation even more uncomfortable than it was. Julie followed suit, she appreciated that he respected her privacy but she knew that in a few moments they would both be in their underwear and having to navigate leaving the store together. When they were done undressing Luke didn't even look back at Julie, he waited to hear her confirmation that she was as ready as she would ever be and quickly poked his head out of the curtain of the change room. He made sure the coast was clear and slowly eased his way out of the change room with Julie following close behind him.

They had to hide behind mannequins and clothing racks as much as possible as to avoid any sale workers seeing them. Julie froze when she saw the woman from earlier who helped her pick out her size now fiddling with a dress on a mannequin, not looking their way but still enough for Julie to freeze in fear of getting caught. Luke quickly ran back and grabbed her hand, pulling her to another hiding spot. The two made their way to the elevators somewhat successfully, avoiding using the main path ways and looking around every corner before proceeding forward. They had almost made it to the elevators when a woman rounded a corner and had come face-to-face with them. Luke grabbed Julie's hand again and ran down the hallway, pressing the button for the elevator frantically.

They turned their back to the elevator to keep an eye on anyone approaching. The elevator opened behind them and the duo nearly fell backwards inside. They both regained their balance and backed into the elevator, Luke once more frantically pressing the button for the main floor. The two made words of encouragement for the door to close faster but it wasn't closing as quickly as they wanted it to. When the door finally did close the two had a small moment of calm. Still not fully looking at one another. Luke had his hands down, covering the front of his pelvis as a futile attempt at modesty in his boxers. Julie also tried to cover herself as best she could with her own hands but she knew there wasn't much she could at this point. At least they both seemed uncomfortable by the situation and she was thankful that Luke didn't make any comments about her body, he didn't even seem to want to look at her which she wasn't sure she should be relieved or insulted by.

Luke cleared his throat to try and break the awkward tension in the air, or maybe in spite of the predicament they were in, as they waited for the elevator to open to the main floor and they could finally leave. The elevator opened, but only one floor lower, to the third floor where a man and a woman were waiting to get on. They stopped when they saw Luke and Julie in the elevator looking the way they did. Julie tried to hide behind Luke to cover herself more but it didn't do much. "Um..." Julie tried to think of a way to explain to the couple why they were in the elevator in such a state but Luke just grabbed her hand again and pulled her out of the elevator with him in a panicked escape.

Luke held out his phone and began recording their great escape, after all, all dares must be recorded on your own phone. They ran down the escalators as fast as they could, earning horrified gasps from those they passed. Julie held her phone out as well but angled it so it only showed her face as she ran. They finally made it to the entrance of the building where a man who worked there tried to stop them but they dodged him and got outside. Watchers outside were cheering for them as they exited the store and Luke lead the way back to his motorcycle. Holding out his spare hand that wasn't holding Julie's to the oncoming traffic to get the cars to stop for them so they could cross the road. Once they made it to Luke's bike they noticed a shopping bag had been left on one of the handles.

"Oh please tell me these are our clothes!" Julie cried.

Luke looked in the bag, "They kind of are." He said, pulling out the expensive clothes they were wearing earlier.

Julie looked at him in shock, "Are these stolen?"

Luke looked back in the bag and found a thin piece of paper at the bottom. "Receipt." He smiled.

"We get to keep 'em?!" Julie asked in disbelief.

"All yours." He replied, already happily pulling on his pants.

Julie also began putting the clothes back on and Luke helped her zip up the dress before she put on the leather jacket to complete the look. "Who paid for these?" She asked, turning back around and looking at Luke, now fully dressed.

Luke shrugged and looked around, "Probably one of the Watchers with daddy's credit card?" He offered. Julie's phone made the cash register noise again and she looked down to see that the $2,500.00 had been deposited into her account. She covered her mouth and couldn't contain her excitement. "What?" Luke asked, smiling at how cute she looked when she got excited.

"Look!" Julie exclaimed, holding her phone up for Luke to see. The two grinned at each other and she couldn't help but jump around in glee.

Luke's phone went off with a new dare. He held up the phone for Julie to see, "Malibu Beach in ten minutes?" Julie gave him a look that said _do you really need to ask?_ Before smiling wide which made Luke smile as well and the two hopped on the motorcycle once more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I probably won't have time to write or post anything tomorrow so here is the new chapter a day early, enjoy!
> 
> Please leave a comment or like if you're enjoying, I love reading what you have to say :)


	4. Trust

Flynn was driving around, jamming out to music, when she received a call from Carrie. "Hello?" She answered through speaker phone.

"Flynn, what does Julie think she's doing?" Carrie asked while Willie and Alex were arguing over a tight parking spot they were trying to squeeze into. She got annoyed at the two bickering like the old married couple their future holds for them and got out of the car.

"I have no idea, Carrie. Why are you asking me? I'm not her keeper." Flynn snarked.

"Well who's this biker she's teamed up with?"

"I have no clue. She just ditched me." Flynn stated, "She's doing what she apparently thinks is best for herself."

"Yeah, and what exactly is that?" Carrie asked sarcastically.

"Carrie!" Alex popped out of the sunroof of the car, "Carrie, Julie is in the top ten!"

"What?" Carrie's tone was more demanding than inquisitive.

"She's in the top ten." Alex repeated.

"Flynn, Julie is in the top ten." Carrie relayed through the phone.

"Yeah, I know."

"How is that even possible? How many Watchers does she have?" Carried asked, looking at Alex.

"Umm..." Alex quickly looked through his phone. "Like, 4,471." He stated.

"Well how many do I have?" Carrie inquired.

"Uhh... 6,806?" Willie joined the conversation after finally parking the car.

"Oh. Okay, I have a lot more." Carrie said with a smile and pushed some strands of hair out her face from the wind. "Flynn, I really don't think that Julie can handle this. I'm actually really worried about her."

"Yeah, me too." Flynn agreed.

"So get your ass to my party and help me, okay?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm on my way." Flynn hung up the call and began navigating her way to Carrie's house.

* * *

Julie and Luke made it to their destination, Malibu Beach. The sun was barely over the horizon at this point and night was quickly settling in. They looked around at the shops along the pier but one in particular was their destination.

"What happens if I bail?" Julie asked, clutching her phone to her chest and looking up at Luke.

"You lose everything you've already made." Luke answered with a nonchalant shrug.

"My dad would kill me." Julie said, no longer staring at Luke but the shop before her.

"What do you want to do?" Luke nudged her.

Julie looked from the dare location a head of her, to Luke and then back to the shop. She took a deep breath and slowly began walking into the tattoo parlor. Luke followed close behind her, sort of acting as her guard before joining her back at her side and sharing a smile with her. This 24 hour, no appointment necessary tattoo parlor didn't seem to be very well known or popular, one of those blink-and-you-miss-it kind of shops. It surprisingly didn't look as sketchy on the inside as Julie was anticipating, although her eyes did have to adjust to the harsh fluorescent, neon lighting when she entered.

**LET LUKE CHOOSE YOUR TATTOO = $5,000.00**

**REJECT ACCEPT**

Julie placed her phone on the counter, she still hadn't officially accepted her dare yet. "Okay, just please no fire breathing dragons, or knives... no clowns. No snakes, no skeletons..." Julie listed off.

"What about pandas in tornados?" Luke asked, pointing at a picture in the book of potential tattoos.

Julie looked at him horrified.

"No?" He laughed.

"No!" Julie couldn't help but laugh as well.

"What about this?" One of the tattoo artist piped up, overhearing their conversation. "Just a tattoo of my dad. He's gorgeous, honestly. He's a nice looking guy."

Luke and Julie exchanged a look without even having to say anything but Julie still couldn't help but smile, her nervous energy was probably making her a little delirious that she didn't know how to react to things anymore. All she could do was laugh and hope for the best.

"Okay. I've got a better idea." Luke reached over and grabbed a notepad and a pen and hunched over the counter to conceal what he was doing.

"You're going to draw it?" Julie questioned, earning a shush from him, "No!"

"Be quiet, I gotta concentrate." He told her and pushed her hand away when she tried reaching for the pen. "Back off." He added playfully with a laugh.

Julie sighed and gave in, this was her dare after all.

"'Kay." Luke said when he finished before bounding over to the tattoo artist that spoke with them a few minutes ago. "Can you do something like this but less... shitty?"

"Yes!" The tattoo artist drew out the word in excitement.

"Yeah?" Luke clarified. Beginning to form a bond with the artist and having an inside joke over Julie.

"You guys, come on!" Julie groaned.

"Hey, you have to trust us. That's the whole thing." Luke objected. "Me and... Dirt Beard." He added after looking over the artist again, earning an understanding and accepting nod from the man.

* * *

They had to wait until a chair became available but once it did Julie was sitting there, needle to skin and barely keeping it together.

"Ow, ow. Okay, you can stop. You can stop! The dare said that it just had to be bigger than a quarter and this definitely feels bigger than a quarter." Julie said, gritting her teeth through the pain.

"You're doing great, it's almost done." Luke encouraged, holding her phone for her and recording the process.

"I think where ever we're at we can just stop -- OW!"

"Hold on, I'm just doing the 'Y' in 'Daddy'." The tattoo artist told her.

Julie looked back at Luke in shock. "What!"

"He's kidding, don't listen to him." Luke stated, barely containing his laughter. Luke saw how much pain she was in and how the buzzing of the needle was getting to her and tried to distract her as best as he could so he came and sat down beside her and tried to engage in conversation with her, get to know her better since they were on this journey together now. "Tell me a bit about yourself, Julie."

"Now?" She squeaked.

"It might help, come on. Like, uh... what do you like to do in your spare time?"

"Music." Julie said, face contorted in pain.

"Listen to music? Play music? What about music?"

"I play piano, write songs, and sing." Julie told him.

"Yeah? Could you sing something for me?" Luke inquired, genuinely curious to hear this girl sing.

"No." Julie said, looking at him in disbelief for asking her to sing in a situation like this.

"No?" Luke raised an eyebrow at her with a cheeky grin, "It might help."

"I don't even know what I'd sing and it's definitely not going to sound good while I have a needle poking in and out of my back constantly!" She told him.

"Pick anything, if I know it I'll sing with you, how about that?" Luke offered.

Julie took a deep breath, looking him in the eye. There was only one song popping up in her mind at the moment but it wasn't one Luke would be able to sing with her. She closed her eyes.

 _"Here's the one thing I want you to know  
_ _You've got some place to go.  
_ _Life's a test, yes  
_ _but you go toe-to-toe  
_ _You don't give up, no, you grow.  
_ _And you use your pain 'cause it makes you you  
_ _And I wish I could hold you through it.  
_ _I know it's not the same, you've got living to do and I just want you to do it.  
_ _So get up, get out, relight that spark, you know the rest by heart.  
_ _Wake up, Wake up if it's all you do  
_ _Look out, look inside of you  
_ _It's not what you lost, it's what you'll gain  
_ _Raising your voice to the rain.  
_ _Wake up your dream and make it true  
_ _Look out, look inside of you  
_ _It's not what you lost, relight that spark  
_ _Time to come out in the dark  
_ _Wake up"_

Julie finished singing, voice cracking from the pain she was experiencing, gripping the chair she was sitting on so tight her knuckles were turning white.

"Stay with me, stay with me." Luke placed his hand on hers and left it there, smiling at her. "You can _sing!_ You wrote that?"

Julie glanced up at him, she knew it wasn't her best performance. Gritted teeth here, voice cracking there, hitting notes flat but yet he looked genuinely impressed by her. Julie shook her head.

"No, it's a song my mom wrote for me. When she died she wanted me to have something for when she'd be gone."

"Again, I’m sorry about your mom." Luke murmured, giving her hand a comforting squeeze.

"Thanks... She was just one of those people that wasn't afraid of anything. She always said yes. She would laugh so hard if she saw me getting a tattoo right now." Julie laughed, smiling to herself while thinking of her mom.

"Boom! I am done. Go to that mirror and celebrate my work." The artist, _Dirt Beard,_ told her.

Julie looked over her shoulder at the artist before looking back at Luke who was biting his lip with a bashful grin.

"Come on." He said, motioning to the mirror with his head.

"Do I want to see it?" Julie asked.

"Yes."

She quickly got up and looked in the mirror to see what Luke had picked out for her and she couldn't believe what he had chose. She was in disbelief but a good disbelief.

"A dahlia?" She looked from her shoulder to Luke in the mirror, "I love it! Thank you."

Luke smiled at her as she turned to face him properly, handing her phone back to her. "Well, a very wise person once said, and this was... earlier today, they said that the dahlia represents a lasting bond and a lifelong commitment between two people. So... I hope one day you get that," He couldn't help but look her up and down, taking in her beauty once more, "and this way you have one more thing to remember your mom with if nothing else."

Julie was stunned, she didn't know what to say at this point. He truly had surprised her. She was forced to put her trust in his hands and he could have easily taken advantage of that and given her a random tattoo that had no meaning at all and one she would regret forever but instead he chose something he knew would be important to her, because he actually had listened to her and remembered her words when they met. He knew it was something she equated with her mother. If Julie wasn't falling for this guy before she certainly was now.

* * *

"How many Watchers does she have now?" Carrie asked, looking over Alex's shoulder at his phone while they checked the leader board.

"I mean... to be fair... you _did_ tell her to take a risk." Alex reminded her.

"This isn't what I meant, Alex." Carrie said before storming off further into her party. "This is ridiculous."

Carrie stormed past Willie who watched her go and then looked in the direction she came from, to Alex, and mouthed "What happened?"

* * *

"Okay." Luke said, tapping his phone to receive his next dare. "Now they're asking if I can trust you." He looked from his phone to Julie, "Can I?"

Julie's eyes lit up, "I have the perfect tattoo picked out for you." She began dragging him back towards the counter.

Luke laughed and rolled his eyes while shaking his head, "Wait, wait, wait. No, okay it's not a tattoo dare."

"What is it?" Julie asked, looking over his shoulder at his phone.

"It just says go to this street corner." Luke told her, cocking his phone at a better angle for her to see. The two shared a look before hopping back on his bike and heading to the destination of his dare. It wasn't a far drive, but looking around Luke really wasn't sure what the dare could possibly be that he would receive as it didn't look like there was much to do.

"Here we go," He said, reading his new dare, "get to 60MPH... That's it."

"Okay?" Julie let out a confused laugh, she wasn't following how this related to him trusting her, her dare was to trust him to choose her tattoo and his dare was to get to 60MPH with her?

"Alright. Easy one, let's do this." He said before he got another notification on his phone and read it.

Julie, who was also reading his phone, saw what they added onto the dare. "What did that just say?" She could not believe what she just read.

**GET TO 60MPH BLINDFOLDED = $10,000.00**

**REJECT ACCEPT**

"Blindfolded?" She repeated. "On the motorcycle?"

"Yeah..."

Julie shook her head, "You're on your own with that one."

"What? Whoa. Hey, hey I can't do this without you. Come on, I need you to help me navigate." Luke insisted.

"There is no way in hell I'm doing that. I'm sorry... I'm out." Julie said, earning a disappointed and discouraged look from the boy she was harbouring new found feelings for. "Thank you, for tonight. I had a lot of fun... I got a new dress... but I -- I'm good." She held out her hand for him to shake as a good bye.

Luke took her hand but held onto it, pulling her slightly closer to him, "Stay... Let's see what else happens." Whether he was doing it on purpose or not his puppy dog eyes were in full effect.

Julie was about to say something when suddenly a truck with a loud muffler blasting rock music pulled up beside them. A guy with dark hair, a leather jacket, ripped jeans, and a red plaid shirt tied around his waist hopped out.

"Yo, what's up, guys?" He greeted, making the duo exchange looks quizzically, "Julie, love your work. Can you hold that for me?" He asked her, handing her a folded sticker that read _Mali-f**king-bu_. "Yeah, hold it up." He encouraged. He took a picture with his phone and quickly hopped back into his truck. "Hey, Luke! I'll see you in the finals." He called out before driving off.

Julie looked from the stranger to Luke. "...Who was that guy?"

Luke shook his head, "I don't know... just... another Player." He responded. "Jules, come on. Do this with me. Please? I need you." He saw that she was starting to consider it, "You get to be in control. Say yes... just say yes..." He was almost begging at this point.

* * *

Back at Carrie's party, Alex had been watching Julie's Curve progress and instantly sprang up when he saw what was coming next. "No way." He walked over to the living room and casted his stream onto the TV. "Carrie, you're not going to believe this!"

"What?" She asked, not really interested until she saw was put on the TV. "What!" She repeated, "Are you kidding me?"

Julie was sat on the back of Luke's motorcycle, seated at a red light. Luke had used the sticker that the leather bound stranger had given Julie as the blindfold for his helmet.

"Ready?" He asked her.

"Yeah..." Julie breathed out the word, clearly terrified.

"Alright, remember, you're my eyes."

The traffic light turned green.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reggie finally makes an appearance in this chapter! I know quite a lot of you were wondering where he was.
> 
> In order to transition the movie into a fic I had to erase a lot of the "Reggie" scenes since it wouldn't really work in written form which made his entrance a bit delayed.
> 
> Please feel free to leave a comment below, I love reading your thoughts. Hope you enjoyed the chapter.


	5. Blindfolded

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julie becomes Luke's eyes.

Cars honked their horns behind them.

"Green..." Julie said, barely above a whisper before clenching her eyes shut and burrowing her head in Luke's back.

Luke revved the engine on his motorcycle and they began moving, the steering was jerky at best no matter how hard he tried to maintain going straight. "You okay?" He called back to Julie when she let out a small yelp.

"Yeah..." She answered, scared but trying to regain her focus, she looked over his shoulder so she could see the street and the traffic.

"Just keep your eyes open." He told her.

"Okay... okay." Julie was still trying to calm herself.

"Hey, I know you're scared but you've got to talk to me, Jules." Luke assured and reminded her.

"Okay, wait. No, no, no." She panicked a little when Luke began increasing his speed.

"You've got this, Jules!" He called back. "What's going on, what's going on? Are we good?"

"Uhh... Taxi to the right. Right!" Luke apparently didn't hear the first part of what he said because he began veering to the right. "No!"

The taxi honked beside them, "You have a sticker on your helmet!" The driver called out the window.

"You're leaning right, you need to go left!" Julie screamed. "Left, left, left, left, left!" They were so close to the taxi now that she reached out her hand and pushed off the car to give them momentum to veer left. unfortunately with the momentum of her push and his navigating left now they were getting too close to the boulevard in between the lanes. "Okay, too far left. Right, right!" Julie tightened her hold around Luke's waist and leaned them both over to the right so that they were in the middle of the lane.

"Okay, I think that worked, yeah? Are we good?" Luke asked.

"Actually... yes." Julie said with a relieved laugh.

"Okay, alright. Just keep doing that." Luke told her.

"Just... lean?" Julie clarified.

"Yes! Lean. Left or right. You are in control."

Julie repositioned her hands better around Luke, towards his center, so that she could truly get as much leverage with their leaning technique as she could. Unbeknownst to her she was giving her friends watching her at Carrie's house a complete heart attack.

"This is good. You're doing great." Luke assured her again.

"Okay... speed up!" Julie instructed.

"Yes boss!" Luke obliged and increased his speed.

Julie weaved their way through leans pass the vehicles in the lanes in front of them. She glanced down at the speedometer on the bike. "Thirty! we're halfway there." She informed him. She looked ahead to check on the traffic lights and luckily for them the light had just changed and she relayed that information to Luke. She did that for any of the traffic lights they would come up, fortunate enough to get consecutive green lights.

"Okay, that's it, you've got this!" Luke encouraged.

"Okay, the next light is..." The light had changed from green to yellow.

"Come on, stay with me, what's going on?" Luke asked.

The light had changed to red but they had no time to stop if they wanted to complete Luke's dare. "Next light is green!" Julie yelled, grabbing one of the handles and accelerating their speed. They sped through the intersection, narrowly scraping past an oncoming van that honked at them as it came to a screeching halt.

Julie continued to lean and swerve their way through traffic, thankfully getting more green lights in their path and calling them out to Luke.

"We're doing this, Jules!" Luke called out to her, Julie looked down and saw they only had a minute left on their timer and were only at 35MPH.

"Sixty seconds!" She told him.

"A-are we clear now?"

"Still clear." Julie answered before a woman on the sidewalk hailed for a taxi and it changed lanes in front of them. Julie screamed as she held tight to Luke and leaned in the opposite direction from the taxi. She managed to get them away from there and continue down the road, entering a tunnel and passing in between two cars side-by-side.

"Time check!" Luke shouted.

"Fifteen seconds!" Julie shouted back.

"Speed!?"

"Forty-five, forty-six, forty-seven." Julie began counting up as the speed increased.

They passed a van that had opened their side door and, with their phones held up, shouted that they loved them.

"Love you too!" Luke shouted back half-heartedly.

"Alright, let's go!" Julie once more placed her hand on top of Luke's and increased the acceleration on the bike. They had three seconds left. "Fifty-seven, fifty-eight, fifty-nine, sixty!" She shouted as they reached the target speed just before the timer had hit zero.

Luke lifted the visor on his helmet and glanced back at Julie with a wide smile, sharing a victory holler before looking back in front of him and noticing they were quickly approaching a building right at the end of the street they were on. "Oh, shit!" Luke yelled.

"Look out!" Julie screamed, returning her grip back around Luke's waist and holding on tightly.

"Hold on!" Luke instructed as he gripped the break on the handle bar as hard as he could. As the bike slowed down he steered the bike off on an angle and they came to a stop just before colliding with the building.

Julie quickly got off the bike, along with Luke, and the two removed their helmets. Jumping up and down in excitement that they actually managed to complete the dare. She let out a triumphant scream of joy and could barely contain her shocked laughter.

"That was the craziest thing I've ever done!" Luke shouted, approaching Julie, equally as hyped up as she was. "You were incredible! I wanna like... ahhh!" He couldn't form coherent thoughts from all his excited energy. He was throwing his arms around as he spoke.

"I can't even believe we did that!" Julie shouted back to him. The two now only a an arms length apart and Julie took a step closer to him, closing the gap between them and giving him a quick peck on the lips before stepping back to see if that was okay. She was easily falling for this guy and with the adrenaline pumping through her, and the fact that they could have died at any point during that dare, she wasn't feeling afraid to try and kiss him.

Luke lowered his arms around her waist and drew her into him as he kissed her more passionately. Julie returned his kiss and the two were lost in a moment to themselves, he brought his hand up to her cheek and cupped it, getting a little more intense. Perhaps his actions were also a little adrenaline-ridden too. They finally pulled away from one another, looking each other in the eyes. "Are you hungry at all?" Luke asked, still holding her head in his hands.

"Pizza?" Julie offered, a little out of breath from their kiss.

"Pizza, I swear I was gonna say pizza." Luke responded, earning a laugh from Julie which he reveled in before pulling her in again for one last kiss.

* * *

Carrie had watched the whole thing from the stream displayed on her TV, she couldn't believe Julie had even done that but also that she was gaining popularity so quickly in the game. She yanked herself away from the crowd that had formed to watch and went into her room to grab her phone, which had been charging, she opened Curve up and addressed her Watchers.

"Hey, Watchers. Okay, listen. You and I both know that I should be in that box, so please, stop holding back. Okay? You guys don't need to be afraid because I'm not afraid, so just give me a real dare." The door had closed behind her. Carrie turned around and lowered her phone to see who it was. A man with dark brown hair wearing a leather jacket with ripped jeans and a red plaid shirt tied around his waist was leaning against the door.

"S'up Dirty Candi." He said.

Carrie recognized him as one of the Players, he was always in the top ten, if not top five. He went by the screen name _Regg!e_ but she didn't know him or know why he was in her room. "What are you doing here?" She asked.

"You're a good Player." He stated, slowly approaching her. "You've got a lot of Watchers, I've got a lot of Watchers. Maybe we could... team up." He offered her.

Carrie looked him over, unimpressed, and shook her head. "I don't need a partner."

"Seems to work for your friend Julie." Reggie goaded.

Suddenly the door opened and in came a few of the lacrosse team members from Carrie's school, Nick examined the situation and looked from Reggie to Carrie. "What's up, Carrie? You alright?" He asked her.

"Yeah, we're just talking." Carrie told him.

"Hey, uh, Sid Vicious. Why don't you show yourself out, man?" Nick addressed Reggie.

Reggie looked from Nick to Carrie before turning back towards Carrie fully and grabbing the hand she had her phone still in. She lifted her hand up and tapped his phone against hers, giving her his contact information.

Carrie looked at him distastefully.

"Call me." He said. A little more serious that Carrie understood why, his tone wasn't flirty but more of a warning.

* * *

Flynn was still on her way to Carrie's house when she received a phone call from Julie's dad. "Hey, Ray." She answered, trying to sound as normal as she could given the circumstances she was under.

"Flynn, listen, I have a quick question. How would I know if I'm being hacked?" Ray asked.

"What do you mean?" Flynn asked.

"Hacked." Ray repeated. "Somebody's been depositing money into my account under Julie's name." He explained.

"That doesn't sound like a hack." Flynn stated. "Normally, they would be taking money out, if they were hacking you."

"Flynn, what are you not telling me?" Ray questioned, taking the dad tone with her.

Flynn hated when Ray would take that tone, "Oh, it must be... it might be Julie's new job." Flynn made up on the spot.

"What, a job?"

"Yeah, that's probably it." Flynn shook her head at her own lie. "She did an online poker thing." What she'd do for her girl.

"Okay..." Ray was sort of following along.

"And she's really great at it."

"Is it legal?" He inquired.

"Yeah! It's legal and she's doing great as you can tell with the deposits but anyway, I gotta go, I'm working on a new track right now. I'm gonna get going but--"

"Well, tell her to call me." Ray interrupted.

"Bye!"

"Bye."

Flynn hung up the phone and gave her head a shake. Not one of her best lies but she knew she had to cover for Julie. Flynn had been in contact with Ray ever since Julie's mom had died, his eyes when he couldn't be around to make sure Julie was okay, she didn't feel right lying to him after everything that had happened this best year but she also knew that things would only get worse if he knew what Julie was really doing. He would think that she was having a breakdown of some kind and drag her back to see Dr. Turner or worse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leave a comment if you're enjoying the series so far! <3


	6. Carrie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains mentions of drowning and drunken, suicidal thoughts. If either or both of those topics may trigger you please do not read this chapter or read it at your own pace/discretion. 
> 
> That being said, I hope you enjoy this chapter and as always comments are welcome.

Julie and Luke decided to head over to the travelling carnival nearby after getting their pizza. They walked around for a little while, enjoying one another's company and the downtime they had between dares, taking in the sights and sounds of the fair that would be gone tomorrow.

"Wanna take a ride?" Luke asked, mouth full with pizza, as they approached one of the attractions.

"Is this a dare?" Julie asked playfully, looking from Luke to the ride in question.

"Nope. It's a Ferris Wheel." He answered and confidently strode over to the ride.

Julie let out a confused laugh but followed after him. Luckily there wasn't a line at this time of night. The machine operator briefly went over the rules of the ride before closing them in and starting the ride up. Julie was beyond thrilled to have a moment of quiet calm for themselves after the dare they had just pulled off. They deserved this. Who knew what they'd be tasked with next?

"So, why are you playing Curve?" Julie asked Luke as they rose higher in the air.

Luke let out a small sigh that he tried to cover with a chuckle but Julie still noticed it. "Trying to help out my family." He told her. "Some things happened that I wish turned out differently."

Julie noticed that Luke seemed reluctant to want to talk about his reason for playing but she wanted to get to know him better so she pried anyway. "Like what?"

Luke shook his head and let out a breath, choosing his words carefully. "This is just kind of something I need to do..."

Julie looked at him for a long moment, debating between trying to push again or respecting his privacy. She really wanted to know more about this guy that she had just met today and ended up going on an unbelievable adventure with, she trusted him but she still didn't know him.

Luke glanced down and noticed there were people recording them on their phones from the ground or the other cars on the Ferris Wheel. "We got some paparazzi. Hide!" He quickly pulled on the hem of his blazer and moved closer to Julie, covering their faces, with a laugh. Julie looked at him with her big beautiful brown eyes and Luke wanted to forget the rest of the world existed, their faces were so close together that he could have easily closed the gap between them and kissed her once more. Instead he wrenched himself away from the comfort Julie's eyes provided him and glanced over his shoulder to see if their 'paparazzi' were still around. They were but there was nothing he could do about that anyway as he lowered his arm and returned back to his side of the car he was sitting on.

Julie looked down at her phone as it began to vibrate, dreading the possibility of a dare ruining this moment for her. Worse, it was a phone call from Carrie.

"What, who is it?" Luke asked when he noticed Julie's mood had shifted to that of a sour one. Julie tilted her phone so he could see better. "So that's Carrie." He acknowledged. "Are you going to get it?"

Julie quickly declined the call with a swipe of her finger. "I don't want to deal with her right now." She told him. Not realizing that Carrie and the rest of her friends were still watching her feed back at Carrie's house party.

"What's going on?" Luke inquired.

"She's just been a lot recently, but, whatever, you don't want to talk about that." Julie explained, brushing off her issues with a wave of her hand and a half-hearted laugh. She had feelings for this guy, the last thing she wanted to do was make him lose interest in her by talking about the drama going on in her life.

"If you want to talk about it, I'm here." Luke offered, "I'm happy to listen."

Their ride came to a stop and Luke helped Julie out of the car before the two went over to a bench to continue talking. Julie took a deep breath, sighing at even thinking about the Carrie situation but maybe talking it out with an objectively third party could help her feel better. At least that's what her dad told her when he convinced her to go see Dr. Turner for the first time.

"I'm just tired of being her sidekick all the time." Julie began, her voice going soft as she looked away from Luke.

Luke smiled and shook his head in disbelief, "That's funny, you don't seem like anyone's sidekick." He told her, earning a gentle smile from his partner in crime, "Could I see that picture again?"

Julie looked at him in confusion and surprise but handed him her phone with the picture she had used for Carrie's contact photo on display. The picture Nick had posted this morning of the two of them together in her Dirty Candi costume, cropped to only show Carrie. "Sure."

Luke took the phone and zoomed in to get a better look at the face of the girl who was causing Julie so much frustration and hurt. "Wow." He said, looking at the bubble gum princess on the screen.

"Yeah, guys go crazy for her." Julie acknowledged, shifting uncomfortably on the bench.

"Nah, I mean... the outfit is... interesting." Luke said with a raise of an eyebrow.

Julie bit back a smile, "She doesn't always look like that. That's only when she's performing. I can show you a different picture where she's looking more normal." Julie offered, reaching for her phone but Luke pulled it out of her reach.

"No, no. I think I've seen all I need to..." He told her with a smirk, handing her phone back to her. "I just, I can't picture you hanging out with someone like this." He scrunched his face at the thought.

"What do you mean?" Julie questioned.

"I-I don't know, she looks kind of... conceited. Is that mean?" Luke observed but felt slightly bad for vocalizing his observation.

"She is! Totally conceited." Julie agreed.

"Yeah?"

"I mean, she makes it seem like I'm boring for not wanting to be the center of attention all the time but doesn't seem to see how unhealthy her mindset is. It's exhausting." Julie confided.

"I'm sure." Luke nodded.

"She's at this party, most likely drunk, and needs me to hold her hair back." Julie speculated. "I'm just over it. I mean, so are her parents. Her mom left years ago and didn't want custody of her, her dad is a famous musician and always in the studio or busy with his career, so she has this revolving door of guys over. It's sad actually."

There was a moment of silence that hung heavy between them, Julie worried she had said too much. That Luke opened a can of worms he wasn't anticipating. She looked down and fiddled with her fingers in her lap, waiting to hear the 'this is too much, I'm out.' from Luke at any moment.

"Hey, that party..." Luke finally piped up. "Should we maybe go check it out?" He offered.

Julie snapped her head in his direction and searched his face, "What? Why would I want to go to that party?"

Luke stood up and shifted his weight from one foot to the other, "Maybe... show off your new tattoo?" He winked at her, extending a hand out for her to take. "Show Carrie that you're not the person she thinks you are?"

Julie looked up at him, a small smile spreading across her face before she shook her head and let out a laugh as she grabbed his hand and stood up from the bench as well.

* * *

Carrie had finally had enough. Listening to what her best friend truly thought of her pushed her over the edge. Sure, they would have their fights and little spats here and there but Julie was her best friend, at least she thought she was, and to now here that Julie thinks so little of her -- confiding in some stranger about how she really felt was just too much. She went and poured herself an all too generous shot into her red solo cup and blasted the music, creating a dance floor in the center of the living room and dancing with any and every guy she found grinding up behind her. That is, until she received a notification with her new dare. She moved away from whatever lacrosse player was behind her and read the dare, her face going pale and she looked out the window to the pool in her backyard. She finished the rest of her drink in a big gulp and coughed as the alcoholic liquid burned her throat.

Carrie was now standing in her pool, waist deep, not entirely certain on how she had gotten from her living room to the pool, she was too drunk and too scared to think clearly. Her dare was to hold her breath underwater at the bottom of the deep end for two minutes. One of her biggest fears. Carrie can go in a pool fine but she never went deeper than up to her shoulders, when she was a little girl her mom had taken her for a boat ride and she had nearly drowned when a big wave knocked her off and she got sucked into the under current. Since then Carrie never went in deep water, she wasn't worried about being able to hold her breath for that long since she was a singer and has done vocal exercises her whole life, learning how to control her breathing but to sit at the bottom of the pool completely alone was terrifying for her.

Carrie began taking hesitant steps forward, closer to the deeper end of the pool. The party goers were shouting words of encouragement but there were also a few who were trying to talk her out of it. Carrie just continued to put one foot in front of the other, now submerged up to her chest.

Inside the house Willie went searching for Alex, grabbing him once he found him and dragging him outside to where Carrie was now up to her shoulders in the pool.

"Oh, my god. Carrie!" Alex shouted. "What are you doing?" He asked, crouching beside the pool next to her.

Carrie continued going forward, holding on to the side of the pool to keep her balance.

"Carrie, get out of there!" Alex demanded.

The water was just under Carrie's nose. She took her hand off the side of the pool and swam further into the deepest part of the pool where she turned back to look at Alex before submerging herself and her phone, in its waterproof case, under the water and descending further and further down until she reached the bottom.

Alex covered his mouth with his hand and anxiously watched from the sidelines, he knew how hard this would be for her and this game was getting out of hand. Willie had come up beside him and placed a hand on his shoulder for comfort and support.

There were muffled sounds all around her. She couldn't make out what anyone was saying. She sat at the bottom of the pool feeling an odd sense of tranquility, she was away from everyone and everything. She was terrified but the terror seemed to be subsiding the longer she stayed down here. She found herself never wanting to come back up, maybe her childhood dream to be a mermaid wasn't as completely ridiculous as she thought it was as she got older. It was hard to read the numbers on her phone as the water distorted them but it looked like she had been down there for thirty seconds.

Carrie closed her eyes, she could do this for another minute and a half. In fact, she felt like she could do this forever, the pain in her lungs from holding her breath was strangely comforting and Carrie found she didn't mind it. In her drunken stupor and fear ridden mind she found herself thinking she'd be fine with never breathing again.

It was now a minute and fifteen seconds that Carrie had been underwater. Alex was pacing beside the pool, crazy worried about his friend. He anxiously grabbed Willie's phone and checked on Carrie's feed only to see that the feed was only showing a black screen. Panic instantly flooded his body, he knew Carrie was still under the water. She was supposed to be holding her phone in her hand and recording the process. Alex looked at Willie and before anyone could say anything he dove into Carrie's pool.

His eyes adjusted to the chlorine burning sensation and made his way to Carrie's motionless body. He scooped her up in his arms and held her tight to him as he made his way back to the surface of the water. He was demanding for people to grab towels and anything he could lay her on to begin CPR if necessary. As people were grabbing whatever they could find to lay Carrie down she spat up water and began coughing.

"Carrie?" Alex's voice was soft and gentle as he looked down at the girl in his arms, no longer the confident and fearless girl she was hours before. "What the hell is wrong with you! Do you have any idea what could've happened to you!" Alex yelled at her out of concern.

Willie tried to calm Alex down, "Alex, give her a second. I know you're scared but--"

"No!" Alex roared. "This is sick. This is all so sick. And you were all cheering her on?! You're monsters."

Carrie gripped Alex's soggy hoodie tightly, "I bail..." She choked out, her voice barely above a whisper and raspy in tone.

"You think?!" He yelled at her. Carrie only held tighter to him and buried her face in his chest as she began crying. Alex repositioned Carrie in his arms and rested his head on top of hers, rubbing her back in an attempt to comfort her. The crowd around began to disperse and decided to start watching someone else's stream since Carrie was now out of the game. Alex slowly eased her out of the pool and him and Willie took her to her room to get her dried off.


	7. Snitches Get Stitches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Luke and Julie arrive at Carrie's party and the stakes are raised.

Julie and Luke pulled up in front of Carrie's house, she eased herself off the bike and removed the helmet, adjusting her hair the best she could. Luke removed his helmet as well and glanced over at Julie, a soft smile gracing his lips. He reached over and helped put some stray strands of hair back into place, his thumb lingering on Julie's cheek. She looked up at him, matching his gentle smile and her eyelashes fluttered without her permission. Luke's smile widened as he took the helmet from Julie and pulled her in closer to him, he wanted a moment of serenity with Julie before they ventured into what was no doubt going to be a raucous filled home.

Julie's confidence in herself has surprisingly grown throughout the day and she found herself not feeling nervous or timid to initiate a kiss with Luke. She leaned into him and kissed him, smiling when he eagerly returned her kiss. One kiss turned into two kisses. Two kisses turned into three kisses. Julie lost count, she was far too blissfully drunk from the moment to be able to think of anything besides the lips of the boy in front of her. They would laugh in between kisses and pull away to look at one another periodically but only for a brief moment before diving right back in for more.

Luke's phone made a noise and interrupted them, he sighed and rolled his eyes, reaching down and glancing at his phone. "We should probably head in there, huh?" He asked, not really wanting to move from their current arrangement.

Julie let out a small laugh and took a step back, "It is why we came here, right?"

Luke offered his arm to Julie with a smirk and she playfully rolled her eyes before accepting his arm and the two walked up the driveway to the house with linked arms. The door to the house was wide open and the music only grew louder the closer they got, they simultaneously gave one another hesitant glances before they were zealously greeted by cheers from friends and strangers alike. People were taking their pictures and applauding them as they walked further into the house, receiving a celebrity-esque treatment that neither were at all familiar with.

Amongst the faces crowding around them, Julie caught sight of Flynn leaning against the wall and the two locked eyes. Julie gave a small wave, not wanting to ignore her best friend amongst all the craziness and also because she hadn't seen the girl since she apologetically left her at the café to adventure with Luke.

Flynn nodded in greeting.

"Jules!" A familiar voice in the crowd called before the owner of the voice made its way to them. Alex greeted Julie with a hug, "Hi! Oh, my gosh, you guys are so famous right now."

"Oh, wait until Carrie sees you." Willie added, referring to Julie's makeover and the drastic character transformation that had occurred in the span of an afternoon into the evening.

"Where is she?" Julie asked, not seeing Carrie amongst the crowd in her own home which was very uncharacteristic of her. She was usually the center of attention and wanted all eyes on her, being the perfect hostess.

"Oh, you guys don't know...?" Alex inquired, pulling them off to a quieter corner, his mood shifting to a more serious one. "She tried to hold her breath underwater for two minutes and nearly drowned. Had to bail."

Julie now noticed that Alex's hair was a bit stiff and more wavy than he usually had it, she guessed he had jumped in to save her. "So she's out of the game?" Julie was shocked.

"Yeah... I need a drink, want one?" Alex surveyed the group and saw that Luke had raised his hand and the two went off in the direction of the kitchen.

"Yeah, it wasn't pretty..." Willie hung back and informed Julie.

Julie needed to find Carrie. She felt so bad for her and knew that Carrie could probably use her right now, needing the comfort of a friend after something like that. She headed in the direction of Carrie's room, hoping she'd be in there and eased the door open as to not disturb her in case she was sleeping. However when she opened the door she saw that Carrie was, in fact, not sleeping but receiving "comfort" from someone else in that moment. Laying on her back, on her bed, Carrie was making out with Nick who was straddling her.

Carrie noticed that the music that was playing from downstairs was no longer as muffled as it once was and pulled away from Nick to see Julie standing in the doorway, jaw practically on the ground. Carrie rolled her eyes, "Oh, come on, Jules. You never even spoke to him."

Julie shook her head, typical Carrie. "It's fine, certainly no surprise." She snarked before leaving the doorway and going back downstairs.

Carrie followed after her, "Yeah, I know it's _no surprise_. You know what's not 'fine' though? I almost died tonight, Julie, and you were nowhere to be found."

"I'm sorry," Julie cut her off. "when you said I should live my life, did you mean I should live my life in your shadow?"

"I was just trying to help you, Jules, because you are the most repressed person that I know."

Julie debated between engaging Carrie in her attitude or once more backing down and letting Carrie walk all over her. Julie before Curve would have backed down but after everything she had been through tonight and the transformation that had taken place within in her would not let her not fight back.

"Isn't that why you keep me around? Because I never tell you the truth." Julie shot back, walking away and reconvening with Luke.

"Yeah," Carrie began.

"Come on, let's go." Julie said to Luke, tugging on his sleeve a bit.

"I guess you don't tell me the truth." Carrie continued. "Because you never told me about how _attention-seeking_ I am. Or about how I just had a _revolving door of guys_ all the time-"

Julie felt ashamed, she didn't realize Carrie had heard what she said. Things she said out of frustration but didn't fully mean. Her phone went off with a new dare.

**FINISH CARRIE'S DARE = $15,000.00**

**ACCEPT REJECT**

"-You never tell me that but you've told everyone that tonight. So please, Jules, go right ahead and show us all what a fiery little spark plug you've become since lunch!" Carrie shouted.

Julie looked from Carrie to Luke, "Let's go." She said, not wanting to play Carrie's little game anymore, guiding Luke back to the entrance way.

"Don't walk away from me, Julie!" Carrie pushed Julie and put herself between Julie and Luke. "Wake up! This is a game. Do you really think that someone like _him_ -" She gestured to Luke, "-is actually going to be with you when this is all done?"

"Whoa - hey, you don't know me." Luke cut in.

"Oh, I'm sorry." Carrie whirled around to look at Luke, "You really like her now?" Her words drenched in sarcasm and doubt.

"Yeah, I do!" Luke shouted at her, defending himself. Noticing how hurt Julie looked by Carrie's insinuation.

"Alright, Carrie," Flynn finally stepped in. "You're just drunk."

"You're really going to defend her after she ditched you to go gallivanting with some stranger all over town and made you lie to her dad?!" Carrie snapped at Flynn.

"Why do you have to be such a bitch?" Julie shot.

A wicked grin spread across Carrie's face, "Look at that, little Julie finally speaking her mind." Carrie patronized Julie, "Come on, unburden yourself."

Julie couldn't take it anymore and decided to do as Carrie asked. "You know why we're best friends? I do whatever you want all the time."

Carrie let out a derivative snort, "No, Julie. We're friends because I'm fun and you're _boring_. The only fun thing about you was your mom." Carrie earned some offended sounds from the crowd that had formed around them during their fight. Julie was visibly hurt that Carrie would stoop so low and say that. "What is it you think? That playing Curve is just gonna magically make you a different person? That's not how life works! You'll never _be_ a Player."

Julie snapped. "Right, right. I know how much you love living in the moment and being the center of attention, Carrie. Well remember this moment because you're one of those girls who peaks in high school. And you wake up one day still living in your dads house without making a name for yourself, still screwing the same guys wondering what the hell happened to your life. If you want to know where I am from now on, sign up and watch me." Julie stormed past Carrie towards the patio doors and removed her coat and dress and dived into pool. She was pissed at Carrie but still didn't want to ruin the expensive clothes she got today, no longer caring who saw her in just her underwear - it may as well have been a bathing suit at this point.

"Wait, Julie what are you doing?" Luke asked when she resurfaced, crouching beside her by the ledge.

Carrie followed after her, her blood running cold when she saw what Julie was about to do.

"Hey, hey Julie, you don't need to do this." Luke protested again, reaching his hand out for her to take so she could get out of the pool.

Julie was only shooting daggers with her eyes in Carrie's direction.

"Look at me, come on, let's just go. Let's bail, alright? What do you have to prove?" Luke pleaded, reaching out to try and guide her face in his direction.

Julie swam out to the deepest part of the pool and, maintaining eye contact with Carrie until she needed to close her eyes, lowered herself to the bottom. Out of sight.

Luke scrambled for his phone and quickly went to Julie's stream where she was sitting at the bottom of the pool, totally content, only showing her face. Underwater, she winked at the camera as the countdown ticked away. Luke looked from his phone to her group of friends and Alex had his hands in his hair, exhausted to be going through this again, Willie had his arm on Alex's back - rubbing it to comfort him. Carrie was completely frozen in place, seemingly holding her breath too.

* * *

The two minutes elapsed and Julie made her way to the surface. Much like Carrie, Julie had done vocal and breathing exercises her whole life with her interest in music. Something her mom had worked with her on. Two minutes was nothing and when she resurfaced she felt completely fine. Luke had his hand reached out and a towel in the other arm awaiting her. She smiled at him and took his hand as she eased herself out of the pool, he quickly enwrapped her in the towel as to try and preserve her modesty. The dare had been complete. Julie was now in first place.

She looked over at Carrie and the two locked eyes once more. However, the fire behind Carrie's eyes was no longer there and had been replaced with fear. Carrie stormed off back into the house and Julie began drying herself off as best as she could. Strangers came up to her and congratulated her on entering first place.

Flynn approached and handed Julie her dress and jacket. "That was messed up." She said.

Julie took the clothes and shook her head, "I can't deal with this right now, okay? I'm just gonna go." She said as she put the dress on as quickly as she could and threw on the jacket.

"Jules, do you know that he's played Curve before?" Flynn questioned.

Julie stopped dead in her tracks. "What?"

"Yeah, it was his dare to get you here and fight with Carrie." Flynn informed Julie, digging out her phone to prove it to her, "That's why he brought you here." She showed Julie her phone, with Luke's dare displayed on her screen.

**GET JULIE TO FIGHT WITH CARRIE**

"Do you still trust him?" Flynn asked.

Julie looked from Flynn's phone to Luke. He looked away. Julie shook her head and stormed back into the house in the direction of the front door to leave.

"Julie, wait!" Luke called as he chased after her.

"Is it true?" Julie asked, not looking at him or lessening her strides.

"Is what true?"

Julie stopped then and spun on him, "Did you take me here as part of the game?" Luke only looked at her, shifting his weight from one foot to the other before looking away. "Answer me, is it true?" Julie demanded.

Luke noticed that people were watching them and he didn't like the vibe that he was getting from some of them, he could tell they wanted another fight or for one of them to bail or do something horrible. He grabbed Julie's hand and ran out of the house, down the driveway, and to his motorcycle where he basically hopped on the bike and began fastening his helmet.

"What are you doing?" Julie screamed at him, standing beside his bike, not wanting to get on and unsure if she could trust him anymore.

"It's more complicated than that." He told her.

"I just lost my two best friends tonight-"

"-I know."

"-How much did you get for that?"

"No, no, it's not about the money, alright? But I-I promise, I'll explain everything later."

"Just don't even bother, okay?" Julie shouted. "I mean, Carrie almost died tonight. _I_ almost died tonight."

"Julie, I know, I know." Luke tried to calm her down.

"This game is sick, I'm going to the police." Julie stated, noticing a police car parked close by and began running in its direction.

"Wait! No, no. No!" Luke jumped off his bike and quickly caught up to Julie and grabbed her arm, forcing her to stop. "I'm sorry." He said as she winced in pain.

"What are you doing?" Julie was growing more and more afraid.

"I'm sorry, you can't do that, alright? You can't go to the police." Luke told her.

"Why not? Because I'll lose the game?" Julie yanked her arm out of Luke's grasp with all her might and began in the direction of the car once more.

"No, it's not about that. Julie, Julie!" Luke called after her. "You can't go to the police. It's the last thing you want to do!" Julie wasn't letting up. "Julie, wait, I wasn't trying to hurt you. It just got out of control."

"Officer!" Julie called as she got closer, halting Luke in his pursuit. "Officer," Julie repeated once she was right next to the vehicle and got him to roll his window down. "I need help. I'm playing this game, it's called Curve and I'm worried that someone's going to get really hurt."

Watcher's nearby started shouting at Julie and calling her a Snitch.

"This game," The officer spoke, "are they playing too?" motioning to the crowd that had formed on the street and were shouting at her.

"Yeah." Julie informed him.

"Is there a crime being committed?" The officer deadpanned.

Julie looked at the cop in confusion and disbelief, "No, but a kid could die tonight." She stated. "Look, here, it's all on my phone, you can see." She reached her arm out to the officer to show him her phone.

The crowd on the streets were getting more and more hostile and Julie noticed a familiar bike taking off down the street.

Julie no longer felt safe and she could tell that the cop had little to no interest to do anything about it so she backed away from the car and began to head in a direction she felt safer, as she did so she received a phone call from her dad. "Dad?" She answered.

"Mija, what's going on?" He asked, his voice panicked.

"Dad!"

"Julie, where are you? All the money is missing from our account!"

"Wait, what?" Julie asked, shocked.

"Julie, sweetie, are you in trouble? Can you just please tell me what's going on?"

"Okay, Dad. I'm gonna fix this, I promise-" Julie came to a stop as a man in a leather coat and plaid shirt had appeared in front of her. The same man she saw earlier when she was with Luke.

"I'm sorry," He said. "But I've got to win this game." He held up his phone and recorded himself knocking Julie unconscious.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments are always welcome <3 :)


	8. Prisoner

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julie discovers another category to Curve

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for the delay in update. This week has been pretty busy and life has been somewhat hectic. I hope you enjoy this chapter of Curve and I look forward to reading your comments if you leave any.

Julie slowly found herself regaining consciousness. She opened her eyes but only darkness stared back at her. She blinked a few times and tried to let her eyes settle into the darkness. She felt around the floor to find her phone and was surprised that it was laying beside her. She grabbed it and turned on the flashlight, bringing herself to her feet to look around at her surroundings. As she stood up, lights began flickering around her and revealed that she was in a storage crate with the writing "Snitches get stitches" written on three of the four walls. Julie was scared and began crying, wincing when her tears reached her left cheek and she quickly put her hand to her face and pulled it away to see that she was bleeding.

On the other end of the crate was an old fashioned computer sitting plugged in on the floor. Sound began emanating from it as Julie cautiously approached:

 **"Hello, Julie."** The familiar robotic voice from earlier greeted her.  
 **"You broke the rules, you are our prisoner.  
** **We told you not to snitch.  
** **Now we control your life.  
** **We control your family.  
** **We control your future.  
** **The only way out is to win the final round.  
** **Go to the location left in your phone and the Watchers will find you.  
** **See you in the finals."**

The robotic voice repeated its final words as Julie began trying to kick down the crate doors in frustration. She kicked it once. Nothing. She kicked it twice. A small budge. She kicked it a third time. The bottom half of the doors gave way. Julie hesitantly made her way towards her exit, ducking her head slightly to leave the crate. Julie took a look around at her surroundings now that she was outside, it looked like she was at some sort of abandoned shipping dock that was almost completely barren. Her breathing began to quicken as panic overtook her body, trying to figure out her next course of action, she focused on trying to calm herself down and think logically as she found which direction to head and began making her way out.

While she was walking she heard distant voices and vaguely could make out what they were saying, the voices belonged to Watchers, and they seemed to be looking for her. Julie didn't trust that they had any good intentions since she snitched and quickly ducked behind another storage crate to get out of sight. Julie's suspicions were validated when she heard one of the Watchers yell "We're coming for you, Julie!"

Julie stayed put for a moment, catching her breath and regaining her courage. She heard someone approaching quickly and tried to run away but was grabbed by her pursuer. "Julie, thank god, are you okay?" The recognizable voice asked. Julie knew who it was before she even had to see him. Luke.

"Am I okay? No, I'm not okay!" Julie barked at Luke, releasing herself from his grasp. "You need to tell me everything, okay? What the hell is going on! Why is this happening to me?"

Luke pulled Julie out of sight once more, finally ready to come clean, "That guy, Reggie, we both played Curve last year in Seattle. We got a dare to eat hotdogs from this questionable hotdog vendor in a sketchy area. The two of us and this kid named Bobby. The hotdogs were of course bad, if not poisoned, and he was lifeless on the ground after one bite. Reggie and I, we bailed and we went to the cops and we tried to get the game shut down but they didn't do anything. No, they just called it an accident. Then, the Watchers came after us for snitching and they messed with my dad's job, the leaked photos of my mom online, they stole our identities, Julie." Luke was out of breath. "Me and Reggie, we became prisoners of the game."

Julie scoffed. "Oh, come on, what does that even mean?"

"It's the third category." Luke stated, "Watcher. Player. Prisoner." Luke saw Julie's face soften, "I'm trapped. The only way out is to win."

Julie watched Luke's features to see if she could find any trace of a lie, she was skeptical to believe in after everything but she could tell that he was being genuine with her and telling the truth. "So you have to win." She said, matter-of-factly.

"No..." Luke shook his head, "No, you do."

"What?" Julie asked.

"Julie, you're a Prisoner now. Okay, you and I, we're going to the final round together and I'm gonna lose." Luke told her.

"What -- no, you can't do that." Julie protested.

"It's already done." Luke spoke over her protests. "It's already done. I told the Watchers to give me a dare that will knock Reggie out of second place. It's going to be me and you." Luke's phone made a sound and the two both looked off into the direction it came from, situated on his motorcycle cell phone attachment. Luke sighed, "I have to go."

"No, no, no." Julie pleaded.

"Okay, I wanna take you somewhere safe, let's go." Luke said.

"There has to be another way!" It was Julie's turn to grab Luke by the arm.

"There isn't." Luke let out a breath, "If it's not me in the finals, then it's Reggie and he'll do anything to win." Luke stared at Julie, desperation displayed on his face. "Just... tell me we're going to do this."

* * *

Carrie and Flynn were driving around the city looking for Julie, Carrie hadn't been able to keep the tears from falling down her face the entire time, she was so worried and grief-stricken over Julie that she couldn't get a grasp on her emotions.

"Hey, it's not your fault." Flynn said, glancing over at Carrie as she drove.

"I just hope she's okay." Carrie stated, her voice hoarse and barely above a whisper.

Flynn's phone began ringing with an unknown number calling her. She reached out and answered the call on speaker phone. "Hello?"

"Guys, it's me." Julie's voice came from the other end of the call.

"Oh, my god!" Carrie let out relieved breath. "Jules, where are you?"

Julie gave them her location and hung up, stating that she'll explain everything in person. The two exchanged a pensive look before Flynn navigated her way to Julie. As they arrived at an underground parking lot they noticed a man on a familiar motorcycle go speeding off in the direction they were coming from. They ventured further into the parking lot slowly, looking for Julie, before Julie had walked out from behind a pillar and stopped them. Flynn barely had gotten the car in park when Carrie threw off her seatbelt and swung up her passenger side door.

Carrie strode over to Julie and the two immediately enveloped one another in a hug.

"I'm so sorry." Julie said as they released one another.

"It doesn't matter, I'm just glad you're okay." Carrie told her, wiping away her tears.

"Alright, guys, come on. Let's go." Flynn said, relieved to see Julie okay but also not wanting to be anywhere that the Watchers could find them.

"I can't." Julie told them.

"What?" Flynn and Carrie asked at the same time.

"I have to finish this."

"Are you insane?" Carrie asked.

"Jules, what are you talking about?" Flynn questioned.

"It's never gonna end, I mean, even if they leave me alone they're just gonna do it to somebody else." Julie explained.

"We can't stop the game even if we wanted to. There's no one to stop!" Flynn argued.

"It's just a bunch of anonymous people." Carrie added.

"What if they weren't anonymous?" Julie countered. "Luke's doing a dare that will put him in the finals so it could be me against him."

"Jules, do you actually trust this guy?" Flynn asked, "He's the person who got you into this mess in the first place."

Julie reached into the back of Flynn's car and pulled out some spare clothes that they always kept in the car and began changing. " _I_ got me into this mess. Anything Luke's doing now is to help me get out. I know it sounds crazy but I can do it. I just need your help."

Flynn and Carrie exchanged a glance before she sighed, "What do you need us to do?"

"Flynn, you said the game is open source, right? Do you think you can change the code?" Julie inquired.

"It's gonna take time." Flynn answered.

"Carrie, could you buy us some?" Julie directed her attention to Carrie now.

* * *

While Julie was setting up her plan with Flynn and Carrie, Luke was out following the directions the Watchers had given him for his new dare. He parked his motorcycle on the street and ventured down a secluded, dimly lit alleyway that eventually lead him to a hot dog cart. He didn't know how they had done it but somehow the same hot dog cart from a year ago in Seattle was waiting for him. Sitting on top of the cart was a hotdog with the works piled atop it. His dare was to finish the entire hotdog in five seconds, even with the risk of food poisoning or whatever it was that killed his friend last year. Luke sighed before he made his way over to the cart.

He hesitantly picked up the hotdog and leaned his phone against the cart so it could record him. "This is really what you guys want, huh?" He asked the Watchers through the screen. He accepted the dare and braced himself for what was to come. He took a bite, the flavour was definitely new and did not taste like a hotdog. It was disgusting. It took everything in him to force down the first bite. He knew he had a limited amount of time and needed to complete this dare. He held his breath and scarfed down the rest of the questionable food. The condiments were getting all over his face but he didn't care. All he had to do was get this hotdog down and then it would be him and Julie in the finals and she would be free.

The timer was up and he completed his dare. It was a hollow victory for as soon as the dare was complete Luke forced himself to throw up what he had just ate. He threw up probably the better half of his entire food intake for the day but he had never felt better in his life, the vile substance he was forced to ingest was gone from his stomach and he was now in second place. He laid on the ground, staring up at the night sky, catching his breath.

* * *

Julie, Flynn, and Carrie had finished coming up with their plan. Carrie and Flynn were headed back to Flynn's car and Julie was off to the location that she had to go to in order to complete the final challenge and break free from being a Prisoner.

"Hey, Carrie." Julie called.

"Yeah?" Carrie asked, stopping outside of the car and looking over her shoulder.

"Use a pay phone." Julie instructed.

Carrie nodded and got into Flynn's car. The two set off to do their part of the plan. The first thing they had to do was find a payphone that still worked in 2020. They finally came across one and Carrie got out of the car to make her call.

Flynn waited in the car for several minutes as Carrie made the call. Flynn texted her cousin that they were going to be needing the assistance of and filled her in on what needed to go down. Flynn's cousin gave them an address to meet them at and Flynn looked up to see Carrie finally coming back towards the car and got in. "How did it go?" Flynn asked.

"It went." Carrie answered.

"It went?" Flynn repeated.

"Yeah... I think it's gonna work." Carrie said.

"Yeah, it better work!" Flynn stated before shifting into Drive and heading to the location where Flynn's cousin sent her.


	9. The Finals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julie and Luke head into the finals while Flynn and her cousin's team put into action the plan.

Flynn and Carrie arrived at the location Flynn's cousin had sent her. There was a small neon cloud sign beside a garage door and Flynn placed her thumb on a finger scanner. The garage door opened after scanning her thumb and she headed in, Carrie's brows knit together in confusion as she hesitantly followed behind. They headed in and made their way to a back room.

"What is this place?" Carrie whispered to Flynn.

"Fastest internet in California." She stated, opening the door to where their true destination was.

"Hey, Flynn!" A woman greeted, getting up from her laptop.

"Hey, HK, we made it." Flynn responded.

"Let's get this started, you ready?" HK asked.

"Is the botnet up and running?" Flynn asked back.

"Yeah, of course." HK answered, doing a secret handshake with Flynn before continuing, "We just gotta enter it into the system."

Flynn walked off to begin working, "Oh and this is Carrie, obviously." She nonchalantly introduced.

Carrie looked around the room, there were a handful of people typing away at computers and in the center of the room was a screen that said "Jules02 VS _LUKE_ in the finals 45:00" and was counting down until the finals.

"Hey, welcome to the Cloud." HK greeted, "Sucks you got axed."

"Alright, let's take this game down." Flynn said, plugging in her laptop and placing it on the table. She opened her computer and went to the source code for Curve and began typing in code to script.

"Okay, how's this gonna work?" Carrie asked, peering over Flynn's shoulder as she typed away furiously at her keyboard.

"It's like Wikipedia," Flynn explained, "where anyone can edit the code but the majority has to approve it. And the botnet can outvote everyone."

"Yo, I got a army of bots here waitin' for orders." HK told Flynn.

Flynn's phone rang and she looked down to see she was getting a call from Ray. "Hey, Ray." Flynn answered, trying to sound regular.

"Where is Julie, what is this game?" Ray's voice came from the other end of the phone, demanding answers.

"Don't worry, she's okay." Flynn said figuring that Ray must have looked at Julie's laptop or something.

"Why won't you explain it to me." Ray questioned.

"I'm gonna give you an address, okay? If you meet me here, I'll explain everything." Flynn told him, glancing at the clock and seeing that 20 minutes had already gone by since they arrived.

* * *

Julie arrived at the location where the final round was being held. It was an old and abandoned house that was very dilapidated and barely had any distinguishable remnants of its former glory. It was in amongst a hiking trail with a beautiful waterfall nearby. According to Julie's phone she was at Solstice Canyon. On her way to her destination the Watchers also had her go on a goose chase to obtain a gun they had placed for her in a specific location.

Julie slowly approached the entrance to the abandoned building. A man with his face almost completely covered was standing guard.

"Ticket." He demanded.

Julie handed him the gun and he took it from her, checking to see the amount of ammo she had before returning the gun to her.

"Better hurry up." He told her as Julie walked past him further into the building.

Julie entered from one end and saw that Luke was entering from the other side. The two quickly ran to one another when they saw each other.

"Players, stop!" A robotic voice called out, stopping them about an arm's length away. "Back up."

Julie and Luke looked into each other's eyes with silent pleas and apologies before doing as told and slowly backing away from one another.

"Stop." The robotic voice instructed once they were at an appropriate distance away from each other. "Players, show us your weapons."

Both Julie and Luke hesitantly raised their guns to the crowd swarmed around, watching them. Cheers erupted from the crowd when they saw the weapons.

"First to shoot wins." The robotic voice stated. Dread and despair crashing into Julie and Luke. "20 seconds on the clock."

Julie shook her head, she was terrified. She looked to Luke who looked equally as scared as she was.

"Do it." Luke told her, barely audible against the crowd cheering. He nodded his head in encouragement, "Start by just raising your gun." Julie didn't move. "Just raise your gun slowly." He coaxed. "Then shoot me in the shoulder, I'll be fine."

"What if I miss?" Julie's voice came out in a squeak, tears threatening to spill over. "I don't know if I can do this."

"Julie, you have to hurry, alright?" Luke glanced at the clock to see they only had ten seconds left. "You have to do this, this is the only way the game can end and then you can walk away!"

Julie shook her head but slowly raised her gun. She watched as Luke closed his eyes and braced himself for the blow, she aimed the gun at his shoulder as the seconds ticked away.

_Five, four, three, two, one._

Julie aimed the gun at the ground and shot. Luke jumped, startled and confused and looked at Julie who was now receiving boos from the crowd. "I'm not doing this." Julie stated and began to walk away.

"Jules, don't -- you can't --" Two gunshots interrupted Luke's protests. Him and Julie both looked in the direction of the sound to see a familiar figure had a gun pointed to the sky.

"I'll do it!" Shouted the familiar voice of the leather-clad boy. He removed his leather jacket and stepped further into the center of the building where all the action was happening. "Did y'all miss me?" He addressed the crowd and received loud cheers in response. "I say we do that dare again. With someone who's _really_ ready to play."

"Don't do it, Reg, it's not worth it, man." Luke told him, holding his hands up at his sides.

"Stop!" Julie shouted, running up and putting herself between Luke and Reggie. Luke, in return tried to put his body in front of Julie to protect her, bringing himself closer to Reggie.

"Whoa, whoa, back up. You have lost your mind, pretty boy, get back!" Reggie barked.

"Is this what you really want? For us to kill each other?" Julie shouted at the crowd.

The crowd yelled back a positive response.

"Of course that's what you want!" Reggie addressed the crowd, hyping them up even more.

"You think that makes you brave?" Julie shouted once more, "Why don't you take off your masks and show yourselves, huh?" Julie looked around at the completely covered faces around her. "You! Take off your mask. Yeah, what's your name?" She singled out a specific individual who didn't comply. "It's easy for you to be brave in a crowd or the screen names you hide behind. Don't you guys see that you're all still responsible for what happens tonight even if you're just watching?"

"Oh, my god, are you really believing this bullshit?" Reggie cut Julie off. "Play to win! Play to win!"

Julie shook her head, watching Reggie amp up the crowd, "You guys really want one of us to die... for a game?" She shouted.

"Yes!" The crowd responded, Reggie's voice being heard amongst the mix.

Julie glared at Reggie. "Then shoot me." Reggie turned and looked at her, his expression unreadable. "I dare you." Julie added.

Reggie nodded, "Okay." He said before turning his attention back to the crowd. "Who wants me to shoot her?"

Luke ran over to Julie's side and tugged on her arm, "Julie, what are you doing?" Julie wouldn't look at Luke and only held her glare on Reggie.

"Who wants me to shoot her?" Reggie repeated, still psyching up the crowd.

* * *

"Flynn, where's Julie?" Ray finally arrived at the Cloud and started demanding answers.

"Alright, calm down." Flynn eased, getting up from her laptop.

"What is this game, I want answers!" Ray saw the screen that was streaming the finals and saw Julie in a faceoff with some guy he'd never seen before and another guy frantically running around trying to defuse the situation. "What are you doing! You better tell me right now or I'm calling the cops."

"No, no cops." HK piped up.

"No, Ray, calm down." Flynn tried again.

 _"Do you want me to shoot her?"_ came loud and clear through the screen. The crowd was chanting _shoot to kill_ over and over again. _"Then vote 'yes.'"_ The guy's voice was heard again. another voice was also heard coming from the screen, telling the crowd not to listen to the other man and to vote now, his voice was a lot more panicked than the other ones.

**SHOOT JULIE?**

**YES NO**

14 seconds were left on the clock, ticking down while Watchers voted.

 _"Come on, let's have a little bit of anarchy!"_ Reggie shouted through the screen.

"Alright, we're getting around them but the IPs are coming in faster now." Flynn said, typing away madly.

 _"Jules, we need to go, right now!"_ Luke's voice was heard, approaching a frozen Julie.

"Oh, my god." Ray watched with nerves wracking. Carrie had come up beside him and was trying to keep him calm and support him while he watch this all unfold.

"Okay, alright, come on, guys, keep it going." Flynn instructed to the room of people trying to fight the votes.

The timer his zero and the voting results flashed on screen.

**YES**

As soon as Reggie saw the results he raised his gun and shot.

Julie collapsed into Luke's arms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave a comment if you enjoy this chapter or are enjoying the chapter so far. Also, HK is a character from the original Nerve movie that no one really fit into the replace so she remains the same and is now Flynn's cousin. The next chapter should be the last one.


	10. Sign Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The final phase of the plan is set in motion.

"Oh, my mija!" Ray screamed out as he watched the events unfold on screen, his eyes glossy as he brought a hand to his mouth. Flynn and Carrie were there to comfort him and tried to tell him it was okay.

Luke's plea's could be heard through the screen, begging Julie to get up. To be okay. Anything really. He was holding her closely, his grip tight on her limp body that he had gently brought to the ground. "No, no, no. Look at me, Julie. Please!"

Flynn turned away from the screen and looked at HK, "Go."

HK entered in the code that sent out their plan to every phone that was using Curve. It decoded their usernames and showed every user their true name, with the message that read "You are an accessory to murder." with the option to sign out of the game. The livestream showed people leaving the area the finale took place, walking past Luke holding Julie without even glancing at them.

Reggie took out his phone and continued recording as he approached the two. His numbers dwindling as the Watchers logged out of the game. Luke looked up when Reggie was standing before them with his phone out and in a fit of anger reached for Julie's gun and pointed it at the leather jacket wearer.

A hand reached out and lowered Luke's arm, "No, wait, stop. Stop!" Julie cried out.

Ray, still watching the screen let out a sigh of relief and couldn't control the tears running down his face.

"Stop, it's okay. I'm okay, it's okay." Julie told Luke who enveloped her in a tight hug, tears running down his own face. "Sorry." Julie whispered when Luke finally released her from the hug, his hand lingering on her face.

Understanding slowly began settling in, "You were in on this?" Luke asked Reggie.

"It was her plan, man, her friend Carrie called me." Reggie said. "That's why I'm here."

Luke pointed at the gun, "The gun.... what?"

"Blanks, bro." Reggie added, holding the gun up as if in a surrender before tossing it to the side and putting his hand up again to show that he meant no harm to neither Luke or Julie.

Luke pulled his hand away from Julie where she had been shot and saw blood on his fingers. Julie cupped his hand and made him look at her, "It's fake." She told him.

Luke pulled Julie in for another hug, burying his face in her neck, "Oh, my god." He let out a relieved laugh.

Julie smiled at him when they pulled apart before looking at Reggie who quickly held out a hand to help her up. "You scared me." Julie confessed.

" _You_ scared _me._ " Reggie echoed her sentiment before looking to Luke who was now standing beside her. "We cool?" He asked.

Luke nodded, and the two clapped hands before coming in for their own hug, "Yeah, we're free." He said.

"She's a badass," Reggie stated, backing away to leave, "watch out for her." He turned away from them and looked at his phone, the sign out prompt was still displayed on his screen and he pressed it with ease.

"That's it! The last Player's out!" HK shouted from her computer.

"Did we get it?" Flynn asked.

"They're out." HK confirmed. "The whole thing is crashing!"

"We got it?" Flynn still asked in disbelief, rushing over to HK's computer to see for herself.

"Ooh! And Curve is officially offline!" She cheered before hugging her cousin.

"We have gamed the game!" Flynn whooped, walking over and leaning against a table.

"You girls are the dumbest smart kids I've ever met." Ray laughed.

* * *

Julie and Luke were still standing in the ruins, staring at one another, relieved to be alive and free from the game, "I'm so sorry." Julie said to Luke.

"No, no. I'm sorry." Luke countered. "I'm sorry for bringing you into all this. I just... I wish we had met some other way."

Julie shook her head. "I don't."

* * *

Flynn was still riding the high of the events that had occurred that night when Carrie approached her. She let out a laugh as greeting.

"And you," Carrie began. "what a rock star." The two shared a laugh. Flynn feeling good to finally be recognized for her abilities by Carrie who often looked down upon her.

"Looks like I can get all your money back." HK told Ray. "They don't call me Hacker Kween for nothin'."

"Really?" Ray asked in disbelief. "Thanks!"

"No problem." HK responded.

* * *

Julie and Luke rode out of the ruins on his motorcycle, back to the pier to watch the sunrise together.

"Crazy first date, huh?" Luke said, his arm around Julie's shoulders.

"Oh, is that what that was?" Julie shot back him playfully, leaning into him as they sat together.

Luke tilted Julie's head up to look at him, "By the way. My last name is Paterson." He told her.

Julie repositioned herself to look at him more comfortably without straining her neck, "Well it's nice to meet you, Luke Paterson. I'm Julie Molina." She introduced, holding her hand out for him to shake.

Luke shook his head and the two shared a laugh. He took her hand, "It's nice to meet you, Julie Molina." He stated before pulling her hand into him and bringing her in for a kiss.

The next day, after a well deserved rest, Julie and Ray sat down and discussed her desire to go to Julliard and how she had got accepted. 24 hours prior Ray was desperate for Julie to stay close to home with him and Carlos but after the events that had unfolded and how he almost lost Julie all together, fake or not, Ray was more than encouraging for Julie to go to the school of her dreams to practice and refine her musical talents. After their discussion the two went up to Julie's room and Ray sat beside her as she clicked the acceptance button in her email.

* * *

Months had gone by since the whole Curve incident. Julie was at Julliard, fearless and fierce. Her and Luke were in a long distance relationship but they made it work and he was more than happy to visit her as often as he could.

Carrie had also gotten accepted into Julliard but she deferred a year to work on herself, outside of her famous father's shadow and the Dirty Candi persona she created.

Flynn had gotten accepted into McGill University where she could continue her passion for both music and technology with the Musical Science and Technology program.

Willie and Alex had moved in together after graduation and were focusing on building a life together as well as Alex's new band he had created with Luke and Reggie, the three of them surprisingly worked really well together and Willie was more often than not at all their rehearsals.

Luke and Reggie were reveling in their freedom from Curve and just happy to be living some semblance of a normal life and reigniting their friendship. Even starting a band with Julie's friend, Alex, and feeling like a family once more. Luke missed Julie like crazy when he couldn't go and visit her, video calls were nice but he'd much rather be with her in person. He had taken a job as a local bar tender to make ends meet, as well as reconciled with his parents that could not wait to meet with Julie. They discussed her coming home for Thanksgiving and combining their families for one big meal.

Curve changed their lives forever, and for the better, but they are all glad that game is long dead and none of them had any intentions of ever participating in that game again if it ever got resurrected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed this series. Please feel free to leave a comment with your thoughts.


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